Pilot employee killed, woman injured in Virginia Beach crash

VIRGINIA BEACH

A longtime employee of The Virginian-Pilot was killed and a woman was injured this morning in a crash at Princess Anne Road and Lynnhaven Parkway, police said.

The crash was reported about 7:40 a.m. near the Wal-Mart after a truck and car collided, said Adam Bernstein, a police spokesman. 

Investigators said that a red Chevrolet truck driven by Ralph Maykowski, 52, was headed west on Princess Anne toward Ferrell Parkway when it went over a curb, across a median and into oncoming traffic, Bernstein said.

The truck hit a silver Honda nearly head-on, causing it to spin around and the truck to overturn in the eastbound lanes, he said. Maykowski was taken to a hospital where he died, according to Virginian-Pilot supervisors. Maykowski was a technical support analyst with the newspaper.

Maykowski went into cardiac arrest at the crash scene, and investigators were looking into the possibility that the attack happened before the crash,  Bernstein said. 

The driver of the Honda was taken to a hospital with neck and back pain, Bernstein said.

Steve Peters, the chief information officer for Landmark Publishing Group, which oversees the Pilot, said Maykowski was an employee who quickly understood different technologies.

“He was certainly very customer focused. He would do anything for anybody. He would go the extra mile,” Peters said. “When he worked on teams, people really enjoyed working with him because he had a really good sense of humor, but was also really good at what he did.”