Heidi French was just getting ready for a conference call at her home in Garibaldi Highlands on the afternoon of July 7 when she heard what sounded like large pipes rolling down the street in front of her house.
“It sounded like boom, boom, boom,” recalled French.
The house shook and the windows in her daughter’s bedroom rattled, she said.
The cause of the ruckus turned out to be a driverless dumptruck with a full load of gravel and dirt careening out of control backwards down The Boulevard, taking out other vehicles and pieces of curb with it on its way, finally crashing into a house on the south side of The Boulevard, just west of the roundabout, according to Squamish RCMP.
“It was a pretty dramatic event,” said Squamish RCMP Staff Sgt. Brian Cumming.
Earlier, when the driver was at the wheel, the truck had been heading south on Perth Drive and as it went around the roundabout, dirt began spilling out onto the street. District of Squamish employees working on The Boulevard alerted the driver to his spilling load, according to Cumming. The driver had pulled over at a level spot on The Boulevard to check his load and then gone down the street to see what kind of mess he had made, when suddenly the vehicle started rolling backwards, unoccupied.
Other than a few emotionally shaken up bystanders, no one was hurt in the incident.“It was miraculous that no one got injured. There was certainly the potential,” said Cumming.
The house was damaged and there was minor damage to the dump truck.
A District of Squamish vehicle suffered significant damage the extent of which is currently being assessed, according to district spokesperson Christina Moore.
There was also damage done to the traffic circle and other district infrastructure such as the sidewalk, landscaping and a lamp standard, she said.
No charges have been laid, according to Cumming. An inspection was done on the vehicle, and the RCMP are awaiting the full report.
Narinder Bir of B & B Excavating & Landscaping, which owns the dump truck involved, said he has never had anything like this happen in his 13 years of owning the company.
The driver had been taking the load to a lot on Glacier View Drive in Garibaldi Highlands, Bir said.
Bir said he spent about six hours after the accident first with the RCMP and then inspectors “They did their inspections, and the truck is nice and clean. There is nothing wrong with the truck – no defects, no nothing, so I think the driver was either in a hurry or he thought he put the brake on, which didn’t go on.”
The driver is not being disciplined, Bir said.
“Our guys weren’t feeling good. It was a tough one,” he said.
“The only thing I told my guys is, ‘No one got hurt.’ That was one of the main things.”
