Out-of-control truck mauls
home in Madame Estate
~ Infant in house unhurt ~
MADAME ESTATE--The first notion of the homeowner when his house in Madame Estate shook violently early Tuesday afternoon was that it was an earthquake. He then thought something might have exploded nearby. It was not until the Watling Island Road homeowner saw the word “Mack” in his living room through a hole above his wall unit that it dawned upon him that a cement truck had mauled his house.
“I heard three loud sounds, ending in a loud smash,” the clearly distraught owner told The Daily Herald between conversations on the phone and talking to police officers on the scene. “I first thought that an earthquake had hit.”
The man’s infant daughter and her caretaker were in the house only meters away in the dining room when the more-than-15-ton concrete-mixer truck smashed two walls before coming to a stop just under a meter into the living room. Surprisingly, no one was injured in any way.
The damage caused by the truck smashing into the living room of the home, and to the surrounding area, was extensive. The truck’s destructive path first uprooted several small trees that had lined Arch Road up until yesterday, then hit a car on the roadside, spinning it completely around, before ploughing through a concrete wall and ending up front-first in the house.
The impact to the car caused most of the rear bumper to implode and forced the hose from the fuel tank, while the truck dragged most of the retaining wall into the living room wall.
The truck belonging to Instant Concrete N.V. tore off the sign for Watling Island Road from the roadside, leaving it crumpled in the man’s yard. It completely demolished the living room wall, toppling over most of the contents of the TV stand that stood alongside the wall.
It is now up to the officers of the Police Force Traffic Division to determine the cause of accident and on whom the blame should be placed, said Windward Islands Chief Prosecutor Taco Stein, who was unaware of the incident until he was called by this newspaper. “Police, of course, would have to look into that, whether it is human error or mechanical error.”
Depending on the results of the investigation, the driver could be found at fault for being irresponsible on the road, or the company could be blamed for not having its equipment properly maintained. However, it could have been a rare unavoidable accident that could have no real source of blame. “The investigation will have to reveal that,” Stein said. “It could also be a freak incident.”
An official report from police on the incident was unavailable up to press time.
This newspaper contacted a representative of Instant Concrete identified only as “Franklin” for comment and was told to call back later, because he was “in a meeting right now.” Later calls to the cell phone number advertised on the side of the truck were not answered.
