A young artist pursuing the dream of “blowing up” in NY took a spill yesterday on E. 84th Street. After tripping over pilled up garbage on the sidewalk Andrew Schoonover was tragically hit by a sanitation truck. He was rushed to the hospital where he was pronounced dead.
“He wanted to take a break from the surfing and get more professional by learning professional skills for design.”
The cousin said Schoonover was a “pretty much your average guy.”
“He was a very sweet guy,” he said. “He went out with his sister a lot and her friends and was working.”
After he was hit by the truck, Schoonover was rushed to New York Presbyterian-Weill Cornell Medical Center, where he was pronounced dead.Andrew Schoonover moved to New York City nine months ago to pursue his dream of becoming an artist and a designer. He had gone to a bar in lower Manhattan with his sister Sunday afternoon to watch the Jacksonville Jaguars game. She went home when it was over, but he stayed out, says the victim’s cousin Jesse Hulcher.
Sanitation workers issued a summons to one business on the block that had trash on the street.
A worker at a deli said that Second Ave. subway construction has forced businesses to leave garbage on the streetcorners instead of in front of their stores.
Hours after the crash, three bags of garbage and a battered old chair were still sitting at the accident scene, and six bags and a stack of cardboard were left near the curb across the street.
Hulcher said Schoonover’s sister — who was too distraught to speak — had been concerned about traffic safety in the city.
“I think people drive with a pretty cavalier attitude, and traffic in metropolitan areas, especially New York City, is dangerous,” he said.
“It could’ve been me. It could’ve been you.”
