OMG! I was sitting in my living room watching the Star Trek: The Next Generation marathon on the SCIFI Channel and working on my website StarTrekToysOnline.com (no longer have that domain) when all of the sudden there was this loud crash followed by several very loud bangs. The whole house shook. I got so scared I jumped from my reclined position and ran to the stairs thinking something fell on top of my roommate and or she fell while carrying something heavy up the stairs. (She has been known to try to carry furniture upstairs by herself.) I started yelling for her to make sure she was okay. No answer. So now I am really getting scared. The sound encompassed the entire back of our house and sounded as if it was coming from the second floor. She finally answered me from our kitchen. I asked her if she knew what had happened and if she was okay. I think she was in shock. She was walking around the kitchen all too calmly while I was panicking. She calmly said, “I think their porch came down.” Meaning the upstairs balcony porch. So I ran outside to look at what happened. What I saw put me into an even bigger panic. I said something like, “holy hell, we have got to move out of here.” When you take a look at the pictures I took you’ll understand the reasons behind that statement. (Combine this with my fear that the college kids that used to live there would burn the house down with the parties they had there all the time.)
Here is what I saw when I went out my back door, my neighbor, the one attached to our house (we’re in a duplex) or one of their guests, drove through their back wall right into the kitchen. This is the type of thing you see on TV not in real life! (Everyone Loves Raymond had his parents drive through the front of the house.) So after taking this all in I ran back in the house and called 911 because I did not know if anyone in the car or in the kitchen was hurt. They said they would send everyone out and they showed up within a few minutes. Pretty good response time, that is nice to know. Once I calmed down a little I realized my neck and head hurt. I gave myself whiplash when I got up so quickly! Our house does not seem to have suffered any structural damage on our side the guys from the fire department came through and check us out. Not sure about the other half. They eventually got the van out of the kitchen and it sounded almost as bad as when it went through the wall. Our cats are still hiding under the beds. I wish I could join them.