Police in Hong Kong are searching for a truck driver who took off on foot after his vehicle slammed into road barriers and went up in flames along the North Lantau Highway during heavy downpours. The accident happened while an amber rainstorm alert was in place, leaving the expressway slick and cutting down visibility across the area. The 16-tonne goods vehicle lost grip on the wet asphalt, spun across the lanes, and hit the barrier with enough impact to ignite the cabin.
The collision sent fragments of metal and debris flying across the roadway, clipping a passing taxi and badly damaging its front bumper. Fire crews and ambulance teams rushed to the site, pulling the injured cab driver and a passenger to safety before taking them to the hospital for treatment.
When emergency responders managed to knock down the fire, they found the driver’s seat empty. The driver had already fled into the nearby streets right after the crash. The wrecked, smouldering truck blocked several lanes for hours, bringing morning traffic to a crawl along the main expressway toward Hong Kong International Airport. Investigators have towed away the burnt-out frame for technical checks and are pulling highway CCTV footage alongside registration files to identify and track down the runaway driver.