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VIDEO: Pickup truck smashes into Vancouver Island home

No injuries reported in Friday morning incident

Nobody was injured after a pickup truck lost control in Campbell River on Friday morning, knocking down a tree and damaging a house.

“I just arrived on scene (and) the truck was smashed into the house,” said Chris Mcnichol, a driver with Coastline Towing, as he prepared to tow a Ford Ranger with damage on the front driver’s side.

The pickup appears to have veered off the road and over a low embankment, travelling perhaps 30-40 feet before it struck a cedar tree roughly 15 feet high outside the house at 281 Alder St.

The tree was uprooted and appears to have scraped across an exterior wall, damaging the stucco and vinyl siding. Drywall was also damaged, said homeowner Dale Proteau, who heard about the incident while he was at work.

“The manager comes up to me and says, ‘We got a call from the police. Somebody hit your house, you need to go,” Proteau said.

Thomas Doherty, chief of the Campbell River Fire Department, said firefighters were dispatched at 10:10 a.m. for a report of a vehicle striking a house.

Shannon Miller, a spokesperson for the BC Emergency Health Services, said that paramedics were on-scene within six minutes of the emergency call. No patient was transported, she said.

Police attended the scene but a spokesperson for the Campbell River RCMP didn’t immediately reply to a request for comment on Friday.

Proteau said the driver was a young man who appeared to be in his early 20s.

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The driver wasn’t injured and he apologized, saying he miscalculated a turn, Proteau said, adding that “he’ll never forget it, and he’ll never do it again.”

“Nobody got hurt, nobody got killed, the house can be fixed,” Proteau said.

The sole occupant at the time was Proteau’s cat, Tucker, who appeared unshaken by the incident.

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