Adrenaline Kicks In For Resident After SUV Slams Into House
ADAMS COUNTY, Colo. (CBS4) – A man is recovering from a seizure Sunday that caused him to lose control of his SUV while traveling west on Interstate 270 and veered off the road, driving through a fence as well as hitting a parked car before crashing into a home with two people inside.
"I heard a big bang," said Pablo Munoz. "As soon as I turned around, the whole side of my house was taken."
Munoz was with his cousin and 2-year old daughter at the time. While the child was inside, the two men were taking care of an oil change. His cousin decided to run to the auto store right before the crash.
"If he wouldn't have left, it would have taken him," said Munoz.
As an employee for the owner of the property, he lives at the home. Munoz says his family is lucky they had such good timing, after the crash his adrenaline kicked in and all he could think of was his daughter.
"My first instinct was to grab her, pick her up and run," Munoz said.
Officials with the Colorado State Patrol said the car lost control around 3:30 p.m. Adams County Fire Rescue transported the driver to the hospital but said he should recover.
"It's like watching a movie, you ever see an action flick?" Munoz explained. "You know where a car goes through a building and you see all the glass."
Once he got his daughter away from the crash and felt like they were safe, he called 911 to make sure someone responded to the scene. The damage to the house threw many of their belongings around the home creating a mess. Munoz says seeing his daughter's clothes on the ground kept reminding him how serious the danger was to both of them.
"It's a scary feeling," he said. "It's something you can't process because you don't experience it all the time."
Munoz is also grateful his cousin decided to run that errand because his cousin was actually underneath his car just minutes before the SUV crashed into it.
"It's a blessing in disguise," he said of his cousin. "There's a reason you forgot something."
The house sits below I-270 with much of the road exposed to the surroundings without any barrier. Munoz has lived there for three years never worried about the possible threat. Adams County Fire Rescue says the home will be condemned so the family will not be able to live there.
"Never the whole time I've been here I thought that would happen," he said. "Never in a million years."
Shawn Chitnis reports for CBS4 News at 10 on weekends and CBS4 News at 5 p.m. and 6 p.m. throughout the week. Email him story ideas at smchitnis@cbs.com and connect with him on Twitter or Facebook.