Caught on cam: Falling light pole hits Edmonton man's vehicle

Video shows light pole falling onto vehicle New video of a light pole crashing onto a moving vehicle downtown. CTV Edmonton’s Nicole Weisberg reports.

An Edmonton man is calling for the city to cover his out-of-pocket repair costs after a rusted-out light pole fell on his vehicle while he was driving.

The light pole smashed the windshield and damaged part of the frame of Jason Orr’s Jeep, which he says will cost him hundreds of dollars to fix. Orr credited the vehicle’s roll cage with minimizing the damage and potential injury that might have resulted from the incident, which was captured on video by another driver’s dash-mounted camera.

The dashcam footage from an opposite lane shows the light pole toppling onto Orr’s vehicle, striking it horizontally near the top of the windshield.

“All of a sudden (I) couldn’t see, glass everywhere, (and the) rear-view mirror flew past my face,” Orr told CTV Edmonton on Wednesday. He says he suffered a few cuts on his arms but was otherwise unharmed.

“I was shaking,” he said. “It basically looked like the front of my car just exploded.”

Orr says the city should have acted sooner to replace the rusted-out light pole, which fell on a “nice, beautiful sunny day” with no wind. “The cause is rust,” he said. “That puts them at fault.”

A city spokesperson said she was unable to comment on specific claims against the city for privacy reasons. However, she did say approximately 8,000 light standards and bases are due for replacement in the city, which has an annual budget of $6 million for that purpose. The new poles being installed are made of galvanized metal meant to protect them from rust.

A city report from 2015 concluded that approximately 1 in every 10 light poles in Edmonton were badly rusted and in need of replacement.

The report was released after a rusted-out light pole fell on a woman’s vehicle in 2014.