When you see what happened to this Powellhurst-Gilbert home, you’ll agree with neighbors that it’s a miracle the driver wasn’t killed in the smashup …
After mowing down a bush, an out-of-control Dodge Dart continues on until it smashes into an outer East Portland house.
Story and photos by David F. Ashton
Homeowner Tina Ankrom has taken pride in her house along SE 136th Avenue, just south of SE Division Street. The home was for years a neighborhood nuisance, before she took it over and moved in three months ago.
“It’s pretty quiet on this residential side street,” Ankrom remarked – that is, until April 29 when a late-model white Dodge Dart sedan mowed down a bush, sped across her driveway, and slammed into her house, at 3:46 p.m.
Homeowner Tina Ankrom gets moral support from her friend and neighbor Ella, after a car rams into her house.
“We were starting to clean out the garage and going into the back yard, when I saw a ‘flash of white’ zip past the window, and heard a loud noise,” Ankrom told East Portland News.
After struggling to open the back door next to the garage, Ankrom saw the Dodge, wedged into the corner of her home, right in front of her.
The homeowner’s brother looks over the damage left by the car.
“I could hear the car motor still running, and we told him to turn it off,” Ankrom recalled, “but he kept struggling to get out the wrecked car.”
He told the driver to wait for medical first-responders, who had been summoned, but the driver would near none of it, and got out of the car.
“I didn’t smell alcohol on him, and because I work in the medical profession, I got my blood sugar testing kit,” Ankrom. “His blood sugar was really high, higher that my meter would read.”
A Portland Police Bureau officer check the smashed vehicle’s identification.
Shortly thereafter an ambulance arrived, checked the man over, and transported him to a hospital for medical evaluation and treatment.
Within minutes, Portland Fire & Rescue Mill Park Station 7’s Engine and Ladder Truck companies were on-scene, checked the structural stability of the house, and then cleared the home for occupancy.
As she watched a wrecker extract the smashed Dodge, Ankrom admitted, “This was nerve-wracking, and I still don’t want to go inside – but fortunately, it didn’t hit the house; the kitchen is just inside that wall, and my brother just finished remodeling it for me.”
Finally, a wrecker arrives, and carefully extracts the smashed car from the house.
A Portland General Electric Eagle Crew member checked over the weather head, breaker box, and electrical wiring on the garage wall – which was now canting inward about 20? at the bottom, having stopped the out-of-control car.
“We were just starting to work on the garage,” Ankrom said, “and it looks like it’s going to need a bit more work now! I’m just glad everyone is okay.”
© 2018 David F. Ashton ~ East Portland News™
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