As of Saturday afternoon, the top half of a power pole on Water Street is being held steady in mid-air on the end of the boom of a Henderson Municipal Power & Light truck.
How the power pole came to be “levitating” occurred Saturday afternoon at about 1 p.m.
Henderson Police Department Sgt. Bill Russell said a man driving south on Water Street had a medical condition which caused him to lose control of his vehicle and run into the pole at the edge of the Rockhouse on the River parking lot.
The vehicle ran through the pole and continued, crashing into three parked cars in the parking lot, Russell said.
“It sounded like thunder crashing,” said Kelli Woodend, who was at the water fountains across the street when the incident occurred. Then after the first crash, a second crashing sound quickly followed, she said.
She said the power pole flew up into the air and then was bouncing up and down still connected to the power lines.
Woodend said there were about four families at the fountains at the time of the crash.
“All the adults at the water park were shaking because he could have swerved into us,” Woodend said. We “were grateful he didn’t swerve right.”
One woman, she said, was crying and said if the man had swerved their way there would have been deaths.
911 Dispatch said the first call came in at 12:59 p.m. Police, Henderson fire Department, EMS, HMP&L and the City of Henderson Street Department all responded to the scene, according to dispatch. The scene was cleared at 3:04 p.m.
Later that afternoon, the bottom half of the power pole lay perhaps 20 yards from its former spot, while the top half hung mid-air clamped to the boom on the HMP&L truck.
No one was hurt in the collision except for the man driving, said Russell. Russell said police won’t release the 61-year-old driver’s name due to the cause of the accident being a medical condition.
HMP&L General Manager Brad Bickett said Saturday afternoon that a crew was scheduled to replace the pole early Sunday morning.
