The three were in a pickup truck on their way to a funeral when they crashed along a smoke- and fog-covered stretch of Interstate 75 near Gainesville early Sunday, according to the man's ex-wife, Celeste Knapp. She said troopers told her about the deaths Tuesday night.
The three killed were Michael and Lori Hughes, and Sabryna Hughes Gilley, Knapp said. Sabryna is Knapp's daughter.
The Pensacola family's truck was so badly crushed and burned that it took investigators more than two days to find Sabryna's body. The wreckage was so extensive that investigators enlisted anthropologists to help identify victims by their bone fragments and teeth.
"They were looking for her because they put two and two together and knew she was in the (truck). They had to peel back layers of the truck to get to her. I imagine she was sleeping back there and found here tucked away in the back," Knapp said.
It appears the family, from Pensacola, was headed south on Interstate 75.
At least a dozen cars, six tractor-trailers and a motor home collided on both sides of the interstate. Some cars were crushed under the bellies of big trucks. Others burst into flames.
Eighteen people went to the hospital.
