Elderly woman rams Cadillac into Plum dental office

No one was hurt when an elderly woman ran her car backwards into a Plum dental office Tuesday.

The impact caused significant damage to the house-turned-office that’s home to Scott Family Dental at 7619 Saltsburg Road at Crestview Drive.

It’s the second time the building has been hit and seriously damaged by a vehicle, said Robert Scott, who started the practice now run by his daughter, Jacqueline Scott.

“It’s like deja vu. It’s happening again,” he said.

The incident happened shortly after noon Tuesday.

According to Plum police, the 88-year-old woman was backing her car out of a parking space beside the building when, she told officers, she hit the gas instead of the brake. The large sedan did a big U-turn in the parking lot, crashing trunk-first into the building.

Robert Scott said the woman was a patient.

“I’ve known her for a long time,” he said.

Scott said he was in the lab on the other side of the building when the crash happened.

“The building shook,” he said. “It sounded like there was an explosion.”

Scott said he moved his practice into the building in 1984 or 1985. In 1989, he said a flatbed truck coming down Crestview lost its brakes and the driver, rather than go straight down the hill and across Saltsburg Road, veered into the parking lot and took out the back corner of the building, near where the Cadillac hit Tuesday.

“Nobody’s ever been hurt,” he said. “This one’s worse, I think.”

The practice had just reopened for urgent and emergency care only in mid-May after having been closed for two months because of the coronavirus pandemic, Scott said.

With covid-19 restrictions easing and having the proper personal protective equipment, Jacqueline Scott said they were considering resuming dental hygiene in two weeks.

That they won’t be able to do that now is, “very frustrating,” she said.

She said they’ll be closed until it’s safe, and they’ll refer patients elsewhere until they can reopen.

“Everything can be fixed,” he said.