FAIRFAX COUNTY, Va. — Police are still searching for a dump truck that caused a mess on I-95 in Fairfax County on Thursday.
A new video shows that truck with the bed raised in the air as it goes down the interstate. It eventually struck an overhead highway sign sending debris on the ground – damaging at least one other car and tying up traffic for hours.
Virginia State Police told WUSA9 they're still looking for that truck, but we spoke with a woman whose car was damaged who may have tracked down the company that owns that truck.
Hazel Villatoro's Toyota RAV4 still drives but has visible damage to its windshield, bumper, and undercarriage.
“It definitely could’ve been a lot worse, but to me this is terrible," she said.
Thursday afternoon Villatoro says she was driving north on I-95 in Fairfax County, headed to a friend’s house.
“This truck has the bed like up and I was actually right behind it, and I was like, it didn’t feel right so I actually jumped two lanes over to the right, so I’m directly underneath the sign," said Villatoro. "He hits the thing and I hear this loud boom and I see the truck bed coming down and then my windshield cracks. This is all happening in like two seconds and then all the sudden I’m spinning like a teacup on I-95."
She says she saw the truck hit a highway sign. Then, her and the truck's driver both pulled over, but the truck driver wouldn’t exchange information.
"He was like waving his phone in my face. Call this number, call this number. I couldn’t see because it was so bright," said Villatoro. "When I took a picture of his screen and pulled over to the shade of my car to be able to see, he just hopped in his truck and drove away.”
Villatoro says after she was hit, she managed to drive to her destination. That’s when she gave that phone number a call and spoke to the trucking company’s owner. Then, she says, the owner sent a tow truck to where she was, picked her and her car up and drove her back home, down I-95 South, past where the collision happened.
"That’s when I started seeing all of the traffic, so when we’re coming south, I saw the sign down and I saw all the traffic from Fairfax to Woodridge," she said. "I was like oh my god. I knew I was right. He did hit it and look what you did.”
But Villatoro says the owner denied his driver hit the sign.
“That there was something in the road that he hit that went up and hit me. He was like it’s not really our fault, but we’re going to cover it for you anyways," she said. "Very much trying to gaslight me into believing what I saw wasn’t real.”
She also told WUSA9 she grew suspicious when the owner chose not to handle the crash.
WUSA9 was there as Villatoro and the company’s owner met at an auto body shop Friday. She says a mechanic told her the damage would cost at least $10,000.
The owner refused to talk on camera but denied his driver was responsible for hitting the sign.
He also says he hasn’t talked to Virginia State Police who say they are searching for the driver of the dump truck and any dashcam video that caught the collision.
Villatoro says she planned to talk to investigators Friday after filing a police report Thursday.
"They just told me they’re going to see what they can do, they’re still looking for him. I gave them all the information," she said. "I guess they couldn’t catch the license plate which I couldn’t get either."
Villatoro just hopes all of this is behind her soon.
“I just want my car fixed," she said.
Villatoro told WUSA9 the company that owns the dump truck has yet to pay for any of the damages to her car but did pay for a rental car for her to use.