Construction garbage truck breaks loose And smashes into parked cars. Divisadero at Vallejo. @CBSSF pic.twitter.com/BVG94MI3PF
— Joe Vazquez (@joenewsman) October 31, 2017
An out-of-control dump truck hurtled down Divisadero Street Tuesday, smashing into nine cars and leaving three people with minor injuries.
The 26,000-pound truck started to roll down Divis near Vallejo Street at around 2:45 p.m., NBC Bay Area reports.
The truck, which had no driver, careened down the block, striking several cars "parked on the left side of the street facing downhill," KRON 4 reports.
The next intersection down, the truck struck three more occupied vehicles, including one driver by a driver for Uber. Occupants of two of those cars, "including the Uber driver, were taken to a hospital by ambulance for seemingly non-life-threatening injuries," according to KRON 4.
Its mad run was eventually stopped by a tree at the side of the road, ABC 7 reports.
If it wasn't for this old tree, police say the truck would have continued rolling all the way down Divisadero. pic.twitter.com/fPTl7SgmCJ
— Vic Lee (@vicleeabc7) October 31, 2017
NBC Bay Area says the truck belonged to Smart Demolition and Excavation, a subcontractor of Synergy housing. They'd been working at a construction site in the area "for a few weeks" before Tuesday's wreck.
Speaking with CBS 5, Smart owner Alex Galvan says that "his employees parked the truck with the emergency brake on, delivered the truck to the construction site and then left."
The truck was "also on special parking wedges to keep it from sliding," CBS 5 reports.
Multiple parked and driving cars hit, possibly by work truck that got loose at Broadway and Divisadero in SF. pic.twitter.com/DOATb42jIL
— Tyson Winter (@TysonWinter) October 31, 2017
But apparently that wasn't enough, as construction workers say that as they began to load up the truck, it "began to move, rolled over the wedges, and then careened down the hill."
According to NBC, police say that truck's emergency brake failed, causing the vehicle to roll.
An area resident who was home at the time of the crash told KRON 4 that "two of her Mercedes SUVs were damaged" in the collision.
Cara Flaherty, who was in one of the vehicles the truck smashed into, tells NBC that the entire encounter "was terrifying."