Students from USCB, Upstate college among dead in Hilton Head bridge crash
Two people killed in Saturday’s Hilton Head Island bridge crash were S.C. college students, one a student and employee at the University of South Carolina Beaufort, and the other who studied at Converse College in Spartanburg.
A pickup truck crashed head-on with a sedan around 2 a.m. on Saturday, leaving three people dead and three injured.
Tyler Carroll, 23, of Ridgeland was driving the pickup truck and was killed.
Jonathan Green, 27, of Hardeeville, an Information Science & Technology major at USCB, was driving the sedan and also died, according to Beaufort County Coroner David Ott.
In the sedan’s back seat was Jordan Johnson, 21, of Beaufort County, a student at Converse College in Spartanburg. Johnson was the third person killed.
Green had worked in I.T. since 2019 at the USCB campus in Bluffton, said university spokesperson Carol Weir.
Also in the sedan was Green’s sister, Lucian Reynolds, who has serious injuries and is at Memorial Health Medical Center in Savannah, said Weir. Reynolds works as a receptionist at the university.
Weir said the tragedy especially hits home because their mother, Twyla Reynolds, is the executive assistant to USCB’s provost.
“We are heartbroken,” Dr. Al M. Panu, USCB’s chancellor, said in an email.
Johnson began studying at Converse College in 2017 and was scheduled to graduate with a degree in art therapy this month, according to Holly Duncan, a spokesperson with the college.
Krista Newkirk, Converse College’s president, said Johnson’s death was “devastating news” in a Facebook memorial post on the school’s official page.
“On behalf of Converse, I express our heartfelt sympathy to her family, friends and classmates during this very difficult time,” Newkirk said in the post.
Xavier Pierce, who studies Communications at the University of South Carolina Aiken, knew Johnson in high school. He said she was a senior at Whale Branch Early College High School when he was a freshman.
He described her as a “very nice person who was very welcoming and accepting of a lot of people,” he said.
Carroll, the pickup driver, “was loved by so many,” according to a GoFundMe account set up for his funeral expenses. “We are all grieving such a substantial loss in our lives. The unthinkable has happened and his family and friends are left with so much pain and suffering. . . . His family would like to have a viewing and a memorial where we can all gather to share stories, hug, cry and hopefully share some laughs because Tyler was quite the comedian.”
The crash sent the truck off the bridge and into Mackay Creek, according to S.C. Highway Patrol Trooper Brian Lee.
This story was originally published May 3, 2021 at 3:38 PM.
