401 truck accident

Truck driver who pushed car down Hwy 401 says he had no idea car was there

New details are emerging today about a bizarre traffic incident that was caught on camera along Highway 401 in Toronto earlier this week — and they're just as confusing as the now-viral dashcam footage itself.

The crash video in question, uploaded to Instagram on Tuesday morning by artist Cory Wells, shows what appears to be a large yellow salt truck pushing a tiny Honda Civic sideways across multiple lanes of traffic.

The driver of the truck deposits the horizontal car on the right shoulder of Hwy 401 near near Bayview Avenue, swiveling the smaller vehicle around to face forward in the right direction as it passes while simultaneously knocking off the car's rear bumper.

Ontario Provincial Police Sgt. Kerry Schmidt addressed the incident during one of his regular Periscope updates on Tuesday morning after he says officers were inundated with tips regarding the strange collision.

"It's been a busy night for officers following up on tips and leads," he said in a live stream from his cruiser just before 7 a.m. on Wednesday, noting that police were able to speak with both the truck's driver and the car's driver.

"Fortunately no one was injured in that wild crash where that car that was sideways across the 401 was getting pushed out of the way by a large yellow commercial dump truck or a snow truck."

Schmidt revealed that the incident took place on January 13, but how it came to be remains somewhat of a mystery.

"The driver of that truck claims he didn't see what was happening in front of him as he was changing lanes and ended up pushing that car off to the shoulder, " said Schmidt.

"That still has yet to be determined," he continued. "The investigation is still ongoing."

No charges have been laid at this time, but Schmidt is encouraging anyone else with information to come forward and contact police.

"We've seen plenty of dashcams in the past couple of days," he said, referring to another high-profile highway incident in which a pedestrian was caught on camera walking across Hwy 427.

"Anyone with dashcam, with interesting stories like this is always asked to call the police and identify what they have, what they've witnessed because that could be a crucial piece of evidence that we're looking for," urged Schmidt.

"It's great to have these kinds of pictures and moving pictures and videos that will assist us in these investigations."

Lead photo by

Cory Wells


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