SAN ANTONIO — A speeding car hit a San Antonio fire truck, causing it to crash into an apartment building on Tuesday night.
The fire truck hit an apartment building at the corner of Hillcrest Drive and Quill Drive.
No one was hurt, but one woman says she was steps away when the truck crashed into her living room.
The woman is one of several tenants who are now without a home.
Carol De Leon says when she heard the car crash into the fire truck, she didn’t believe it was real. She went to check out what happened.
“I thought it was a movie I was watching, but it wasn’t it was right there outside…I went close to my door and saw the smoke,” De Leon said.
The smoke was from the sheetrock, walls, and staircase broken by the fire engine.
The firefighters who were on their way to another call when the crash occurred started helping right away.
"I was stuck in the house and couldn’t get out because the door was jammed,” De Leon said.
De Leon says other tenants in the building saw the driver of the vehicle take off and get picked up by someone else that drove down West Quill Drive.
The San Antonio Fire Department says the truck was a reserve vehicle that received severe damage.
The Fire Department says the crashes happen more often than they’d like to all first responders.
‘It’s a state law. Give us that right of way. It helps with our safety so we can get home safe to our families after our shifts and it keeps the folks on the roadways safe,” Joe Arrington, Public Information Officer for the San Antonio Fire Department said.
“You just have to have a better perspective on how your choices and behaviors affect others,” Michael Geraci, the building’s owner told KENS 5.
Geraci says the American Red Cross is helping the 17 people without a home right now
That includes De Leon and her family—who are worried for what’s next.
“Everybody just had to pay the rent, they don’t have anywhere to go,” De Leon says they were given gift cards to rent a hotel room.
De Leon says she is going to help the other tenants. She hopes the suspect who started this chain reaction can be caught.
According to the fire department, San Antonio Police are searching for the driver who fled the scene.