3 Vehicles Burn After SUV Hits Garage, Sparking Blaze

Traffic was halted for four hours Saturday morning on busy Irvine Avenue on the border of Costa Mesa and Newport Beach after a new SUV crashed into a garage, causing a fire that destroyed a new Mercedes-Benz and late-model Hummer.

No one was seriously injured in the 7:30 a.m. accident.

The garage was separate from the home in the 2000 block of Irvine Avenue. Owners David Weisman, 45, his wife and 7-month-old child escaped unharmed, police said.

Damage to the vehicles was estimated at $200,000. Damage to the garage, where the fire started after the engine of the SUV, a 2004 Suburban, kept running, was about $60,000, said Christopher P. Riley, Costa Mesa battalion fire chief.

The blaze took firefighters about 15 minutes to extinguish.

Elizabeth Fleming, 43, of Newport Beach, had pulled her Suburban from the curb when her vehicle was struck by a pickup, Newport Beach police said.

Fleming then accelerated, drove across the southbound lanes of Irvine Avenue and crashed into the Weisman’s garage door. Inside was a 2004 Mercedes-Benz 500 SL and a late model H2 Hummer, police said.

Fleming had minor bruises but did not require hospitalization. She and a dog escaped from the vehicle before it burned.

The pickup’s driver, Brian Donald Hayes, 43, of Newport Beach, also was not hospitalized.

The accident is still under investigation.