South Fayette Street homeowner speaks out after tractor trailer flips feet from his home

BECKLEY, WV (WVNS) — Retired trucker Richard Dobson lives on the 1700 block of South Fayette Street in Beckley.

He said on Tuesday, May 21, 2024, that he has asked West Virginia Department of Highways, which oversees the street, to help deter speeding at a curve that is around 20 feet from his home.

“I’ve been complaining for the last couple of years,” he said. “I’ve had three or four mailboxes knocked down. People have come in the yard, knocked the hedges down.”

On Tuesday morning, he said, he made another call to WVDOH to ask for help with speeding. Later in the afternoon, he reported the problem to Beckley Police Department, offering his driveway as a police stake-out to nab speeders.

Around a half hour after making the call to BPD, he said, his wife arrived home from the grocery store and narrowly missed what could have been a horrific tragedy.

A tractor trailer crashed at the curve, he said.

“I was sitting on the porch when it happened,” said Dobson. “My wife had just pulled into the driveway. Only God saved us. Another ten or fifteen feet, that would’ve been it.”

The driver of the tractor trailer told 59News he wasn’t seriously injured in the crash. He waited across the street and spoke on a cell phone.

He told 59News he was wearing his seatbelt and indicated he was apologetic for the trouble to the Dobsons.

Beckley Common Council Ward 5 Councilwoman Janine Bullock came to the crash site to make sure constituents were unharmed.

She said she planned to reach out to WVDOH officials to find help for the Dobsons.

“I plan on them actually taking some action,” said Councilwoman Bullock. “He said he has been speaking with someone there for a number of years about the speeding on South Fayette Street, and this is (WV) Route 3, and we’re definitely going to get something done with this happening so close to his home. I just thank the Good Lord that the accident didn’t happen at his house.”

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