A THREE year-old boy had a lucky escape in North Tawton last week, when a runaway lorry ploughed through the wall of a house in the town. The boy had been sitting in the passenger seat of the lorry while his mother was delivering a skip to landscape gardener Andrew Greenhill in Fore Street last Thursday. It is thought that as she got out of the lorry to check the vehicle?s position, her foot caught the brake. By the time she was out the brake had fully released and she could only watch in horror as the lorry containing her son rolled downhill. Andrew Greenhill witnessed the incident. He said: ?It?s quite fortunate nobody got hurt. It?s a busy road.? He added that although the three-year-old had been crying, he had been unhurt and was retrieved from the vehicle by his mother as soon as it stopped. ASAP skip hire in Winkleigh were the owners of the lorry and skip, and had employed the woman. Company owner Mr Entwistle said: ?The truck and house were very badly damaged. But they are just bricks and mortar and can be repaired.? He added: ?The woman who was in the truck was a bit shocked, she was obviously concerned for her son. We are all just relieved that no-one was hurt.? Fortunately, the boy had been wearing a seat belt, and a three-inch thick oak beam in the house prevented the lorry from ploughing further inside than it did. The house is owned by John Leader from Corsham in Wiltshire. Mr Leader has been renovating the property since last year. ?Last October I had the whole of the front rendered and the whole of the top was replaced. Now the whole of the house will have to be redone,? he said. Mr Leader was upstairs at the time of the crash. ?Suddenly I heard this scream and a bang and the whole house shook,? he said. Fore Street was closed for almost three hours while fire crews ensured the vehicle was safe and a structural engineer checked that the house was structurally sound.
