Two Edmonton homes were struck in separate hit-and-run crashes in north and southeast Edmonton early Wednesday.
North Edmonton hit and run
Around 12:10 a.m., police were called to a home in the area of 122 Avenue and 92 Street that had been hit and significantly damaged by a silver sedan.
The sedan drove through the property’s fence before colliding with the house.
Edmonton police said that there were no reported injuries.
Tamara Lepretre, who’s lived at the home for several years, had just returned home and gone inside when she heard the car coming.
“We heard squealing,” she said. “You could hear it coming closer and closer … but you don’t think it’s going to hit you … and it actually hit. It hit my stairs, my fence and it shook the house. It shook me.
“The guy just took off … and then it came back just to check it out. Who does that?”
Lepretre said she was in the room next to where the car crashed through.
“It missed me. I wouldn’t be here if it hit me,” she said.
“I’m glad and I feel lucky that I actually never got hit and was able to walk away. It came so close.”
Lepretre said the driver looped around a second time.
“I could just hear him and all I could hear was screeching brakes, you know how when you’re turning a corner and speeding? It was pretty intense.”
She said her roommates saw the car come back.
“They saw him turn and you hear the car come all the way around. I thought it was going to hit us again.”
The vehicle was last seen travelling on 122 Avenue at 96A Street, police said.
No one is in custody and Edmonton police said they continue to investigate.
Southeast Edmonton hit-and-run
Around 2:10 a.m., a Jeep Grand Cherokee crashed into a house at 42 Avenue and 70 Street, causing significant damage.
Ransford Kusi-Menkah was sleeping in the place he’s called home for 24 years.
“We heard this huge bang. We rushed down to find an SUV sitting in our dining room,” he said.
“It sounded like a big explosion.”
“At first I thought maybe it was a big clap of thunder. But we came downstairs and there was dust that looked like smoke in the house … I saw the last of the SUV in the family room.
“The whole wall is gone. My living room, my kitchen, the dining room is all trashed.”
He said he’s called the insurance company, which is sending out an adjuster and inspector.
“The police told us to pack up our things and get out … We cannot actually stay there.”
Ransford’s son Richard spent two-thirds of his childhood in that house.
“It sucks. It hurts. I think what actually hurts the most is just knowing how much my parents had to do to get to this place, to have this house.
“My parents have put a lot of work into this house. They’ve renovated it a few times. They just did the floors not even two years ago.”
He believes the vehicle must have been going very fast in their residential neighbourhood to cause the damage it did.
“For them to pick up enough speed to go over the curb and crash through the living room and shift the house, they must’ve been beaming it,” Richard said.
It was a close call for his mother, who was getting up to go to work.
“It’s scary. She might not be here right now if she was in the living room or kitchen. She could be in the hospital or not even not around.”
There have been no reported injuries.
Police said three people fled the scene. The investigation is ongoing and no suspects have been found.
Police said they don’t believe the two hit-and-runs are related.
Anyone with information can contact police at 780-423-4567 or leave an anonymous tip through Crime Stoppers.