An Orange County chicken wings restaurant is being sued after a woman said she was seriously wounded when its ceiling collapsed — the second time such as incident has occurred there, the lawsuit says.
Dajah Stover, 25, of Orlando, filed the suit Wednesday against Flyers Wings & Grill on West Colonial Drive. She is accusing Flyers of negligence for not maintaining its ceiling, despite the fact it was previously cited for violations in which the ceiling showed signs of damage and disrepair and even had a tile missing, according to the lawsuit.
Stover, a regular at Flyers, said at a Thursday news conference she had gone there Oct. 6 for its lunch special after leaving Valencia College, where she goes to school. She had sat down to eat with her then-1-year-old daughter when part of the ceiling came down, which she initially thought was an earthquake or sinkhole.
She said she was struck by part of the ceiling tile and a vent from the restaurant’s air conditioning unit, with blood “pouring” from her head. An ambulance arrived and took her to the hospital. She said she received injuries to her brain and neck, making it difficult to walk outside in the sunlight and causing neck aches when she looks down at her phone for too long.
Stover said her daughter was sitting where the debris fell just before the incident. Initially sitting across from her, she said she decided to sit next to her instead and scooted her out of the way of where the ceiling would soon come down.
“That was by the grace of God that she didn’t get hit,” Stover said. “I’m not saying that I should have gotten hit, but I’m glad it was me and not my daughter because the injuries could have been way more worse.”
While she says she used to love Flyers and even held her birthday parties there, she now is afraid to go back into the restaurant and is upset with how they treated her afterwards.
Her attorneys say another woman was injured at Flyers in August 2024 when a piece of the ceiling fell and hit her head in a different part of the restaurant than where Stover was injured. That woman was represented by the same law firm as Stover and reached a settlement with Flyers before any litigation was filed.
The lawsuit says Flyers was cited by state inspectors for damaged and missing ceiling tiles in May 2025, five months before Stover was injured. Inspectors also issued citations after finding the restaurant’s ceiling tiles were soiled with food debris, grease, dust or a mold-like substance on three separate occasions, the suit states. First in October 2023; then September 2024, just two weeks after the first woman was injured; and again in October 2025, just three days after Stover was injured.
When a reported called Flyers for comment Thursday, an employee said the owner and management were unavailable.