Crash kills truck driver

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A flatbed truck rammed through a streetlight and crashed into an apartment building on University Avenue late Tuesday afternoon, killing the driver.

The truck, heading eastbound without cargo, veered off the road to the right and slammed into apartments at 407 E. University Ave. The fuel tank was punctured upon impact, spraying gasoline around the truck. The gasoline then ignited, surrounding the cab in flames.

The driver - who weighed 300 pounds by witnesses' estimates - was trapped between the seat and the truck pedals, said Sgt. Thomas Frost of the Champaign Police Department.

Fire trucks responded within minutes of the accident and extinguished the fire. Paramedics then pulled the unconscious driver from the charred cab of the truck and performed CPR before lifting him into an ambulance.

The driver was alone in the truck at the time, and there were no other injuries. Police are still investigating the cause of the accident.

Brian Blahnik, a University graduate student, was in his apartment facing University Avenue when he felt a jarring crash.

"I went out (to my balcony), and a semi (had) hit our balcony," Blahnik said. "The whole front of the truck was on fire."

The heat from the fire melted away the vinyl siding on the front of the building, exposing the tan insulation underneath. Smoke from the fire could be seen from several blocks away.

Blahnik quickly left the apartment as fire alarms sounded and smoke started to pour into his apartment. However, he went back inside the building soon afterwards to rescue his two cats, he said.

Wilma Brown was heading west on University Avenue with her husband and seven-year-old granddaughter when they saw the truck hit the building.

"We stopped dead, we saw the truck catch on fire, and my husband got out of the van and tried to rescue the guy from the truck," Brown said.

Andy Thompson, senior in LAS who lives a few doors away from the building, said he heard "a loud ka-thunk" and saw a mass of smoke rise from the building as a man rushed into the street to stop traffic.

"It's the sort of thing - you hear it, you don't know if it's a (car) crash or an explosion," he said.

Next door to the apartment, Ben Gardner was buying some Chinese food at Golden Wok, 405 E. University Ave. Gardner said the truck hit the lamppost "more or less straight on," knocking it onto a Nissan Maxima owned by Golden Wok owner Vilayphone Keodara.

Gardner said he noticed that live electrical wires from the streetlight were exposed. Worried that people walking nearby could be electrocuted, Gardner, an electrician with IBEW Local 601, found a pair of pliers and cut the wires.

The driver, whose name has not yet been released, was taken to Carle Foundation Hospital in Urbana. He died Tuesday evening, according to Champaign police.

- Scott Bort contributed to this story