A Hampton family falls victim to a car driving into their home not once, but twice, and maybe more when you go back in history.
No one was hurt either time, but what if it happens again?
Delilah and Clarence Grubb say Hampton is not helping them get out of harm’s way, so they reached out to 10 On Your Side.
You know you are at the Grubb’s home on Fox Hill Road, which sits apparently perilously at the end of Nickerson Boulevard, when you see the big hole in the house covered up by wood.
The house was hit January 24 by a man suffering from a medical condition, and was hit February 2015 by a drunk driver.
Clarence Grubb points to the hole in the house, “The man was coming down Nickerson. He went airborne, went into the house, and it’s not the first time. The first one the lady came in off Fox Hill, and slammed into the corner of this house,” Grubb says pointing to a different colored brick used to fix the first hole in 2015.
Grubb even has video of the car plowing through their home on January 24. This was a medical emergency driver. The Grubbs claim it’s the sixth time their house has been hit, but city records only go back five years.
Inside where the car hit, the bedroom is dug out.
The crash was so devastating it moved the house off the foundation. It sits condemned, unfit for human dwelling.
There is a hole in the wall where Clarence notes his brother-in-law’s head slammed into after being pushed to the side by the car coming through the wall.
Debris also contributed to the hole. “It sounded like an atom bomb going off,” Clarence said.
The Grubbs are frustrated by the city’s response, or lack of response, says Clarence.
The city put up some right-of-way markers, and made some promises, Clarence said.
“First they said they would send guys out here, and said ‘yeah, we are going to put a guardrail in.’ Then I get a call a few weeks later saying ‘no we’re not going to put a guardrail in.’ We aren’t going to do anything,” Clarence remembers.
It was the reason why the city wouldn’t put up a guardrail — they said there wasn’t room for it — that really got to Clarence.
“They said it could kill the driver, so I said ‘so you care more about the driver than the four people in this house?’ I don’t buy that in the least,” Clarence says.
10 On Your Side contacted the City of Hampton, and they emailed back saying they put up signs and lights, but there’s not enough room on the property for a guardrail.
Clarence Grubb says there’s plenty of room on the property for a guardrail, the city just won’t do what is necessary to give his family peace of mind.
