Trucker Stung by Bee Drives Into House

A wayward bee sent a man to the hospital, a heavily loaded dump trailer-truck off the road and a house shuddering five feet off its foundation in Upland, California Highway Patrol officers reported.

The accident occurred at 1:15 p.m. Friday when truck driver Fred Bowse Jr., 43, was driving his trailer truck, pulling two bottom-dump trailers full of gravel, west along West Arrow Route. A bee flew into the open window of his truck, stung Bowse, giving him a severe allergic reaction, and Bowse passed out, said Officer David Boyd of the Ontario CHP office.

The truck left the road, plowed through a garden and crashed into a house in the 1900 block of West Arrow Route. “That truck destroyed the house,” Boyd said. “It knocked it five feet off its foundation. Officials of the City of Upland have already condemned it.”

‘My Arm Stung’

Bowse said the bee stung him on the right arm near the wrist “where those big veins are, you know. I just picked him off my arm and threw him out the window. Then I picked out the sting. My arm stung like hell, but I didn’t think anything more about it. I’d been stung before when I was a kid.

“Then a couple minutes later things started going fuzzy. My vision got yellow, with little specks all over it, really strange. So I put the truck out of gear and tried to hit the emergency brake, but I just didn’t make it. I passed out before I could even reach the brake. That was the last thing I remember.

“The next thing I knew was waking up in the truck, inside the house, and this guy who was trying to help me was standing outside the cab shouting, ‘Are you all right?’ The engine of the truck was still running, so I turned it off so there wouldn’t be a fire.”

Bowse was treated in San Antonio Community Hospital in Upland for cuts on the face and released three hours later. He said later that his arm was still swollen from the bee sting, but otherwise he felt fine.

Covered by Insurance

Bowse, who has his own business, is the owner of the truck. He has been driving 27 years and this is his first accident, he said. “The truck is well insured. My insurance will also cover the house.”

No one else was injured. Roy Durnal, who lived alone in the house, was away working at the time of the accident, the CHP said. Durnal could not be reached for comment.

“I’m glad no one was hurt,” Bowse said. “It was one of the first things I thought of when I was coming round. Material things can be replaced. But human life . . . you can’t replace that.”