News

Ten injured when Monster truck goes into crowd

Posted August 09, 2007 11:00 pm

Mike Wiser

A Monster Truck careened into a crowd of people, injuring 10, during a promotional event gone awry at a downtown auto parts store Thursday.

All 10 injured were taken to Kishwaukee Community Hospital for treatment, but two - a mother and daughter ages 26 and 4 - were later transferred by helicopter to OSF Saint Anthony Medical Center in Rockford.

Officials were not releasing victim names Thursday.

Six victims, including a mother and her four children, were treated and released, said Sharon Emanuelson, a spokeswoman for Kishwaukee Community Hospital. The other person injured was in good condition and another person refused medical treatment.

As part of the 2 p.m. event at the NAPA Auto Parts, 607 E. Lincoln Highway, the NAPA Monster Truck was driving over junk cars on a blocked off section of Sixth Street while a gathering of more than 100 people looked on.

On its fourth pass, the driver lost control of his vehicle which headed west into a crowd of onlookers then into a fence at a nearby McDonald's restaurant before coming to rest on railroad tracks.

Witness Patrick Sheridan, 16, said NAPA staff members had asked observers to stand back from the road after the truck's first few passes.

"I watched the guy go over two or three times getting some air and one time he went up and he came really close to hitting people," Sheridan said, adding that the truck appeared to come within just three feet of bystanders.

The final pass "was like a full-out jump because he, like, floored it and it just went up and landed on the back tires and kept going," Sheridan said.

"It sounded like he couldn't get the gas off and like it kept going and going and going," he said.

"There was just this sound of steel crunching," DeKalb resident James Vesely told The Daily Chronicle of DeKalb. "I ran over to see if it hit anybody's car, and I saw a woman and a little girl around 3 years old lying on the ground with dirt on them."

The manager of a bicycle shop on the block where the accident happened said he didn't see the incident but saw the truck performing stunts beforehand, and estimated at least 100 people were watching.

"It looked very precarious," said Tobie DePauw, manager of North Central Cyclery.

"I think the woman and her child were run over by the vehicle," DeKalb Fire Chief Lanny Russell said. "The others that were hurt, I don't know if they were hurt getting hit by the truck or diving out of the way or what."

Russell said that none of the injuries he had heard of were considered life-threatening, but that the mother and child who were transferred to Saint Anthony Medical Center were in the worst shape.

"It's so wonderful that she was talking to me right before they took her away," said Lisa Heffron, whose 12-year-old daughter, Rebecca List, was among the injured.

"When it first happened, I thought the worst, that maybe she was dead."

Heffron was back at the accident scene about 4 p.m. with friend Vonie White to pick up her car and go back to visit her daughter at the hospital. She had already been there for about an hour and said Rebecca was doing fine.

Russell described the initial scene as "chaotic" but said police and fire officials were able to get the injured into ambulances and on their way to the hospitals without incident.

DeKalb Police Sgt. Jason Leverton said train traffic on the railroad was shut down for about an hour and a section of East Lincoln Highway was closed for about half that. Sixth Street, from East Lincoln to Locust Street which is where the accident took place, was still closed to traffic at 4:30 p.m. while police gathered physical evidence from the scene.

Among the evidence is a video taken by a NAPA employee and now in possession of the police, said Lt. Jim Kayes.

He said he has seen a small portion of the video and that his officers had interviewed the Monster Truck's driver, as well as other people at the scene. The vehicle was also impounded.

"It would be simple speculation to say what happened at this point," Kayes said. "We don't know if it was a mechanical failure, driver error or what."

He declined to comment further about what the video depicts or the state of the driver except to say that the man - whose name was not released - seemed pretty shaken up.

"Now, I didn't interview him myself," he said. "But this was his job, his livelihood. He seemed very concerned about what happened."

No arrests were made and it was not known Thursday if charges would be filed. "That's a discussion we'll have to have with the State's Attorney, which we haven't had yet," Kayes said.

City Manager Mark Biernacki said the NAPA store had obtained all the correct permits for the event.

"This is the first time we ever had this particular event here," Biernacki said.

The Associated Press contributed to this report.Staff writer Mike Wiser can be reached at 815-987-1377 or mwiser@rrstar.com.

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