Eyewitness Recognized Truck in Rollover
Sunday, May 26, 2013 @ 6:11 AM
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(Truck ran out of control from bend at lamp standard, then flipped. Photos – 250 NEWS)
Prince George, B.C. – A city resident who witnessed a spectacular single-vehicle crash on North Ospika Boulevard early Saturday evening says the truck was involved in more than one incident.
Two men were taken to hospital to be checked over after an older truck with a wooden box containing roofing supplies came down North Ospika, rounded a curve at Ayr Place and ran out of control for approximately one hundred yards before hitting the curb and flipping onto its roof. Emergency officials on scene indicated neither occupant was seriously hurt. An RCMP spokesperson said alcohol was believed a factor in the rollover.
In an exclusive interview with 250 News, Chris Hoff says “I was coming back from the hospital, my wife’s there visiting her niece right now, and I saw this truck. He was behind, you know Ahbau Street, Spruceland Shopping Centre, and he hadn’t obeyed the stop sign there. And I thought, well these guys are driving a little crazy eh. I get home, (just off North Ospika) they must have made another stop because I beat them here, but I heard the squawk of tires the minute I got home, came back through the door and here’s this truck, completely out of control, both of his tires right off the ground, but he was still able to get all the way down to here (where the truck came to a stop). And man you could hear the crash. I think it’s these building supplies. Looks like they’re a couple of roofers, I see some roofing nails and some asphalt shingles. I made the 9-1-1 call at that point. I let them know I’d seen two male occupants in this vehicle before, and I was pretty certain it was the same truck and sure it is. It is exactly the same truck.”
Hoff says he has no doubt the truck was speeding. “He must have been doing 85-90 kilometres an hour, this truck was absolutely accelerating, like he wasn’t slowing down. There was no brakes on at that point. He was whipping by. Unscathed though, it’s just amazing. It’s probably a bench seat, maybe they were able to get their heads down when the roof collapsed.” Hoff says the truck appeared to be heavily loaded. “The amount of materials on the back of that truck, you could see the weight was there and it was like a locomotive eh. Lucky ‘cause there’s people walking up and down here steady.”
Hoff says that particular corner is a bad one, but people are speeding through there regularly. “And the “crotch rockets” here, it’s like it’s their little speedway. They go “Hey let’s go down Ospika, there’s some fun little turns there”. Well they come through here doing a hundred and twenty. It’s nuts. But this won’t be the last time I’m sure. I made a statement to the officer there because he was looking for the first people at the scene.”
Comments
As I said on another post. We need these areas to be policed on a more regular basis.
The police need to stop unsafe erratic driving, especially in residential areas.
Not sure how, or where the police spend most of their time, however if its in filling out reports, or going to court we need to find a solution.
I do see police staked out a four way stops, or once in a while on the highways, however it seems they need to drop the hammer on some of these speeders, to get their attention.
There are a lot of **Yahoo’s** driving around this town, and its time to clip their wings.
I seen a fellow come down Ospika a couple of weeks ago going like a bat out of hell, heading North, almost crashed at the intersection of 1st and Ospika,regained control, and carried on down the road. I suspect that he was **pissed**. Didn’t get the license number.
This was in morning around 9/10 am. In addition this intersection is a school crossing, and has lots of traffic.
The police need to work the off highway areas as much as the highway areas, and concentrate on slowing these people down.
We know in the past we have had casualties on the North end of Ospika. This is one of the routes that people take to get to the Foothills bridge in the summer to float down the river. Its not like it takes rocket science to solve this problem.
Remember that stepped up law enforcement last long weekend. Me and some buddy’s rode bikes out to purden so we were on that highway 5 hours. Never saw one cop. So wherever they are it’s a well kept secret. What’s that extra law enforcement tax for on our icbc premiums. I think the drug dealers have them so busy they have no time for traffic duty. Maybe drugs arent so harmless after all if the cops have to spend time busting dealers for dealing and trying to kill other dealers and addicts for stealing to pay for drugs
Could have edited that down a little. He was accelerating or not slowing down. Or something.
Busting drug dealers costs money. Ticketing errent drivers raises revenue. Pick one.
As long as people understand that ticketing drivers just raises gross revenues and does not change driving habits, we are okay.
If we want to change driving habits, a different approach is needed.
Now, I said it raises GROSS revenues. Do we know for sure that it raises NET revenues?
Factor in the cost of staff in cars, the cars, their maintenance, the office admn component, the court system for those who dispute a ticket, etc. etc.
You see, there are lots of things we really do not know. I hope someone responsible for such decisions knows.
Now, busting drug dealers, on the other hand also has an expense as well as a revenue stream which should be found found in reduced costs to the health and welfare system, etc.
One more thought.
The way to a good outcome for an activity such as driving from A to B starts with a proper design, followed by proper education, and then enforcement if needed … and finally be altering the design if none of the subsequent steps work.
So, it is obvious that the design might meet some standard, but high crash numbers per volume of traffic would point to a design that may just be on the edge of meeting a standard, or may not meet a standard after all.
That is built as a collector road at the end of an arterial which actually ends up being an arterial for those heading to Foothills. In that case, the hill portion is most certainly not to standard for an arterial.
Unless going to Wilson Park, I think for those familiar with the area would know enough to take a left at Otway Road since that is the shorter (both time wise and distance wise) and safer route.
Ticketing rule breaking drivers to protect them from themselves. Busting drug dealers protects the public from them. For at least one day and maybe eighteen months of their probation. Plus a firearms ban for ten years which will just protect us even more. Drug dealers have lawyers appointed to defend them. The motorist? He just pays. Simple, eh?
Looks like the same piles of junk roofing materials left on the back roads all over our city.
So you are telling me that if I were to ask for a list of the reasons why people are in jail, there would be no one in there for dealing drugs….. interesting.
Gus, I think you are mixing up Ospika and Tabor. You have to be going north on Tabor to turn left on Otway. If you continue on Tabor, you are right, it is a bad corner. N. Ospika also has a bad corner. Both are not bad if you are doing the posted speed limit or less.
You’re right TiaPH. I think, however, that both Tabor and Ospika going down to Sterling subdivision seem to be undersize when compared to a similar collector – First Ave between Foothills and Tabor. Due to the curves, sighlines are poor in places.
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