Truck Plows Into Building

As employees at Country Financial were getting ready for lunch Tuesday, a potential client came barreling through the wall.

A white pickup truck traveling eastbound on Washington Street crashed into the Country Financial office located in the Washington Square shopping plaza in Grayslake, across from the . 

The driver of the vehicle was injured and taken by ambulance to Condell Hospital.

The vehicle drove directly into the office of Tim VanderMeer, the agency manager. "I had just been at my desk and left the office to go pick up lunch when the accident happened. I'm pretty shaken up by that," said VanderMeer.

New employee Gloria Holman had spent the morning being trained when she heard what she thought was a crashing sound.

"I saw the vehicle and crawled through the debris to help the lady out. My biggest concern was making sure that whoever was in there was all right. She was bleeding pretty heavily and I got her outside until the paramedics got here. It seemed like forever," said Holman.

Dale Morin assisted Holman in retrieving the driver from the wreckage. He works for the owner of the plaza and saw people running toward the building. "Someone said the roof had caved in and I was like there's no way that would happen," said Morin. "As soon as I saw it, I couldn't believe it."

Country Financial employees Brant Spreitzer and Sanjay Kantharia were busy at work when they felt the building shake. "It was like an earthquake. We thought the buidling was going to crash down," said Spreitzer.

Grayslake police and fire department officials were unable to provide any details on the identity of the driver or on the injuries sustained as they were in the process of  investigating the accident. For safety reasons the building was being checked for structural damage and to determine if the utilties, including the gas lines, had been affected by the impact.