Mostly Man-Made Disasters 1976

The second half of the year brought its fair share of accidents to the area.

11202 Sageville and the home of Roy Crowell, from the July 15th edition. 

Fire at the Williamson home, two weeks after they moved in. 8/5/76 edition

From 9/8/76:

The small subdivision of Kirkwood South was instantly put on the map last week when a driverless bulldozer weighing approximately 100 tons slowly but destructively traveled approximately a quarter of a mile destroying three homes and miraculously stopping within two to four feet of killing four year old Sharon Boggan who lay trapped in her bed.

Law enforcement officers, construction workers, bulldozer operators and news media who made their way to the scene of the accident, and peered into the totally destroyed bedroom, marveled at the fact that Sharon is alive and unhurt. 

Her small French Provincial bed [I love this detail!] was totally covered with sheetrock, insulation, roof beams, and shingles.  The blade of the bulldozer was at the foot of her bed. Again and again the same comments were heard, "It's a miracle" and "I've never seen anything like it".

One unidentified man who had previously driven the dozer told the Press that he could not understand "how in the world the dozer was thrown out of gear just in time to keep from crushing her."

Investigative officials indicated that apparently a board hit the lever "just right" to put the vehicle in neutral. Those same officials point out, though, that there is a guard rail around the shifting lever which would make it difficult for a board to reach the lever.

The house was 7 months old.

It appears the case was never solved. From 9/29/76

12/1/76, the gigantic hole the City of Houston dug and left for months on end on Palmcrest. "Neil plans to appear before the City of Houston City Council today, Wednesday, in an attempt to get the city to take care of this and other problems in the Genoa area, including broken water mains which have buckled numerous residential sidewalks and flooded yards. In addition, he plans to report complaints from Genoa residents about raw sewage backing up into their years due to improper drainage."