Oct. 16 -- Four teenage boys were seriously injured when a car they were in crashed into a house and caught fire Tuesday morning in Kansas City’s Northeast neighborhood.
The car crashed into a house near Smart and Jackson avenues after jumping a curb and slamming into a tree, said Sgt. Bill Mahoney, a supervisor with the Kansas City Police Department’s traffic wreck investigation unit.
The car caught fire after hitting the house.
Firefighters extinguished the blaze quickly and removed the victims from the car.
All four boys were taken to a hospital. Two of the boys were in extremely critical condition, Mahoney said.
Police were going through the belongings in the car to see if they could identify the victims of the crash and notify their families.
“They are young,” Mahoney said, indicating the teens appeared to be high school-aged.
No one was in the house at the time of the crash.
Chri Snowbarger, who lives on the corner across from the crash, didn’t see the wreck. But she heard it.
“I just heard this loud crash — to the point it startled me and I threw my phone,” she said. “I couldn’t even find it for a second.”
Snowbarger peeked out through her window to see what had happened and saw the car had crashed into the house.
“There was a little bit of embers starting to burn underneath the car,” Snowbarger said. “I didn’t know what to do. I called 911 and told them how urgent it was and that they needed to come right away.”
She watched as one of the boys climbed out of the car. He appeared to be very disoriented.
“I wanted to help, but I didn’t know what to do,” Snowbarger said. “I knew the fire was going to pretty soon make the car combust.”
Speed appears to be have been a factor in the crash, Mahoney said. Police have not determined how fast the car was going.
Kansas City police and fire crews responded to the crash.
An ambulance responding to the scene was hit by a truck near Independence and Askew avenues.
The house was damaged, but there was no structural damage and it is still habitable, Mahoney said.
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