Police are looking for the driver responsible for knocking over a fire hydrant in Rancho Bernardo causing a near 50-foot geyser that flooded a home.
SDPD says the driver hit the hydrant on the corner of Aguamiel Road at around 4: 15 p.m. and took off minutes later.
The man who lives on the corner said he heard a bang and before he knew it, his home was inundated.
“I was watching TV in my house heard a crash,” Adolfo Velazquez said. “Before I could react there was water pouring inside my house.”
Then he ran outside to see a truck backing out of his yard.
“We came out to the driveway and I saw a gray truck sitting on the sidewalk there, water spewing, and the truck sort of backed up and pulled off the curb,” Velazquez said.
Velazquez said he’s certain the driver was in a pickup truck, but couldn’t offer police a better description than that.
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The heavy flow of water flooded his house and bubbled paint on the walls inside. The crash also did considerable damage to his yard.
Velazquez was glad that he and his family weren’t hurt, and said the damage could have been worse.
“[The roof] didn’t collapse. It could have collapsed because it was going for a long time. A pretty good 15, 20 minutes. A lot of water. A lot of pressure,” he said.
Velazquez said the force from the geyser even tossed large rocks around the neighborhood. But despite the wreckage, he remained in good spirits.
“It’s just material things. It’s just an inconvenience.”
A neighbor said the soaring spectacle rivaled one of the natural wonders of the world.
“Old Faithful would have been envious with that much water,” Shannon Fiore said.
