A 25-year-old Fort Worth man who was drunk pulled his Honda out in front of a Shale Tank truck at 4:00 o’clock this morning at the I-20/820 interchange and caused the tanker to crash through a retaining wall and dangle 100 feel off of the ground.
The story was so dramatic that it made the national news.
Nicholas Colon, 25, and his wife Amy Howell, 26, were pinned beneath the empty water truck in their car for three hours before firefighters could extricate them.
It is a miracle the tanker did not fall onto vehicles below and cause catastrophic injuries.
Colon was taken into custody at JPS Hospital on suspicion of DWI and unlawfully carrying a weapon. Scary, huh?
Willard, also 25, was in the cab for about an hour until firefighters could rig a harness on a ladder truck to reach him.
Fort Worth police and firefighters performed heroic measures to save the three people.
They used hydraulic cutters to open the passenger side and pulled Colon and Howell to safety.
The tanker caused a 13 foot hole in the wall, but the Texas Department of Public Safety investigated it and found it to be structurally sound.
“Given the situation, I was relatively surprised that everyone was in good shape,” Officer Hatch of the Fort Worth Police Department said.
The ramp will be closed from 6:00 a.m. to 5:00 p.m. Sunday to repair the wall, Lopez said.
Think it’s time to crack down on drunk drivers? In August 2006, Colon was convicted of driving while intoxicated in Dallas County and received 18 months probation.