Woman spooked by stranger accidentally drives off cliff

(CNN) - A California woman sitting in her car admiring the view near a lighthouse was so startled by a stranger that she drove off a cliff.

The woman was parked Thursday outside the Mark Abbot Memorial Lighthouse overlooking Monterey Bay when a stranger startled her by opening her passenger side door.

The incident panicked the woman enough that she stepped on the gas and went over the short cliff behind the lighthouse.

Police say this was “truly an accident.” The person who opened the passenger door had parked nearby in a similar car and, because it was dark, mistook her car for theirs.

Fortunately, the driver suffered only a minor injury to her foot.

The wrecked car had to be pulled off the beach with a tow truck’s crane.

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