A car with a suspected drunken driver at the wheel barreled into crowds watching a homecoming parade at Oklahoma State University on Saturday, killing four people and injuring more than 40 others, authorities said.

Witnesses told of bodies being flung dozens of feet as the gray Hyundai Elantra plowed into the throng at the intersection of Main Street and Hall of Fame Avenue in Stillwater, some 130 km northeast of Oklahoma City, at the end of the parade.

Stillwater Mayor Gina Noble and local police said the car crashed through barricades and struck an unmanned police motorcycle before carving through the mass of spectators.

"At first we thought it was part of the show," Konda Walker, a 1991 graduate of OSU, told the Stillwater News Press. "People were flying 9 meters into the air like rag dolls."

Representatives for OU Medical Center in Oklahoma City said the hospital received eight victims from the crash, five of them children, ranging in condition from good to critical. One of those patients, a 2-year-old child, later died.

Stillwater Medical Center said in a statement that its staff had treated about 40 patients aged 2 to 65. About half of them had been released by Saturday evening.

The driver, identified as 25-year-old Adacia Avery Chambers, was taken into custody on suspicion of driving while under the influence of alcohol, said Captain Kyle Gibbs of the Stillwater Police.

(China Daily 10/26/2015 page12)