NEW YORK — A woman is lucky to be alive after surveillance video shows a boom truck crashing down and landing directly on top of her vehicle.
The woman was driving down a street in the Bronx when the arm of the boom truck came crashing down. Surveillance video obtained by WABC shows the moment the arm fell, flattening the top of the car.
Another video from a different angle, shared on Twitter by WCBS reporter Alice Gainer, shows debris falling with the boom arm, landing so hard it appears to bounce.
The Department of Buildings told WCBS that its preliminary investigation found that the boom truck was lifting rebar when the arm gave way and fell. The truck was involved in construction underway on an 11-story residential building nearby.
The woman inside the car, identified only as a 22-year-old, escaped the ordeal with only a hand injury, likely a result of broken glass, WABC reported.
“It sounded like the World Trade Center,” Ticey Williams, who witnessed the accident, told WABC. “I was standing there, and all of a sudden, I was looking up, and I saw the beam pop, and it was coming down, it was like a movie. I was like, ‘there’s no way this could be happening.’ So then when I heard the crash from the wall where it hit, and then the car, bam! I just knew someone was dead. But thank God the lady was all right. We snatched the door open and got her out.”
The boom also knocked down a street lamp and left debris on the road, WCBS reported.
Twenty-nine workers from a nearby construction site were evacuated as the Department of Buildings evaluated whether the area was safe, WNBC reported.