Five children aged between eight and 17 have been killed in a devastating crash which saw an car smash into a tree and burst into flames.
The deceased were all from the same Connecticut family and died on a highway in New York state on Sunday morning, police confirmed.
Officers believe a 16-year-old boy was behind the wheel when the vehicle veered off the Scarsdale road before hitting the tree.
A nine-year-old boy was the only one of six people in the Nissan Rogue to survive the crash, according to a statement provided by Kieran O'Leary, spokesperson for the Westchester County Police Department.
The survivor had been “apparently riding in the rear hatchback/cargo area and escaped out the rear," the statement continued in quotes reported by the Daily Mail.
The boy was taken to hospital with non-life threatening injuries.
The identities of those killed have not been released but there were four males and one female.
Matt Conway, the superintendent of schools in Derby, Connecticut, said the children were from a family that had recently moved to the area from New York but they had not enrolled in the district at the time of their deaths.
Conway said he reached out to the father on Sunday and offered to provide him information about available supports in the community for him and his family.
"It's the unimaginable,” he said. “Having to now make arrangements for five of your children to be buried is a very difficult thing for anyone - one child, never mind five that you're going to have to now make arrangements for."
