Families' plea as car hits house

Aug 13 2007 By Will Oliphant, Birmingham Mail

FAMILIES who claim lives are being put at risk in a Birmingham street by reckless drivers are calling for action after a car smashed through the front of one home.

Mum-of-two Tracey Howle and her two children were in bed when an Audi sports car crashed into their living room in Court Road, Balsall Heath, at around 1am on Saturday.

"I didn't know what it was and we didn't even know it was our house at first," said Tracey, who was recovering at a friend's house with her boyfriend Yankuba Cham, 33, and her two children Charmaine, 15, and Michael, 11.

"I just heard this huge roar and a crash. Everyone was shouting and screaming and we couldn't see anything because the electricity meter had been knocked out so there was no power.

"We couldn't get out of the front because the front door wasn't there any more so we had to get out the back and go out through the front of our neighbours' house."

Fifteen people in the street were evacuated from their homes for several hours before the area was declared safe.

Jimmy Smith, who lives next door to Tracey, said: "We came out the front and all we could see was smoke.

"We helped our neighbours out through our house and then we just stood there.

"It was only afterwards we realised how close we had come to being killed."

Mr Smith, 40, who is married with two children, said he and his neighbours were now planning to send a petition to the council calling for one end of the road is closed off to stop it being used as a rat run.

"You wouldn't believe the speeds at which people come down this road. It's only a matter of time before someone is killed," he said.

Two men aged 22 and 24 have been arrested on suspicion of drink driving and bailed while police continue their investigation.