Person escapes submerged truck found in Cole County

ABC 17 News confirmed a person is not injured Tuesday after escaping a submerged truck found lying on its side in Cole County.

The Missouri State Highway Patrol said they got a call Tuesday morning about the truck on Loesch Road.

The agency’s first priority at that point was to find out whether or not someone was in the vehicle.

Highway Patrol and Cole County immediately launched boats and navigated to where the truck was and found no one inside.

They made contact with the driver later at his home.

He said he lost control of the truck two days ago as he was trying to drive through the moving water.

He was able to escape and made arrangements to have the truck picked up when the water level went down.

Driving his car on a flooded road was the first thing the driver did wrong, according to the Highway Patrol.

The second thing was not calling in the accident to the authorities.

“If anything like this happens, it’s always good to call law enforcement. Call us, call the sheriff’s office. Even if you don’t need a report or need help, it’s good for us to know what’s going on so that we don’t send crews out and put them in harm’s way when they don’t really need to be,” said Trooper Brian Geier with the Highway Patrol.

Geier said driving on a flooded road is an unnecessary risk and that drivers should find a detour instead.