BY LINCOLN ANDERSON | A 63-year-old Battery Park City woman was struck by a van on Canal St. on Wed., Feb. 18, shortly after 11 a.m., and died from her injuries the next day, police said.
Following an investigation, police reported that Yu-O Pan, of 380 Rector Place, was attempting to cross Canal St. midblock from south to north near Mott St. when she was hit by a 1998 Ford van traveling eastbound on Canal St.
Responding officers found Pan lying on the ground with body trauma. An EMS ambulance transported her to Bellevue Hospital where she succumbed to her injuries on Feb. 19.
The vehicle’s driver remained on the scene and the investigation is ongoing, police said.
The woman’s son, Gary Pan, 35, said his mother had been shopping for items for the Chinese Lunar New Year.
“She was buying oranges, chicken, pork, stuff like that,” he said.
He said she owned a restaurant in Brooklyn Heights, though declined to name it.
Originally from Taiwan, she came to the U.S. with her husband in the early 1970s. They lived in various spots in Downtown Manhattan, including Bayard St., Broadway, Bayard St. again, then Brooklyn Heights, before settling in on Rector Place at Battery Park City, where their son lived with them.
They were a very close-knit family, said her son, who works in IT. He was their only child. They have no other relatives in America.
No services have been held, he said, due to the “surprising cost of funerals.”
He said he couldn’t provide a photo of his mother because they never really took family photos, which he regrets now.
“I haven’t had time to digest it,” her son said of the tragedy. “They said she was crossing on the green, but that she was hit pretty hard. They said she popped out between two cars — that was the account of the driver — but she was hit pretty hard.”
