Car catches fire in Hazel Dell

When a 1964 Volkswagen that looked British because of its MG kit went up in flames in Hazel Dell around noon, Brandy Thatcher-Hughes acted instinctively — she pulled out her cell phone and snapped a photo.

“I’d never seen anything like it,” Thatcher-Hughes said.

Thatcher-Hughes e-mailed The Columbian and then relayed her account of the event by phone:

She was stopped at the light at the intersection of Northeast Hazel Dell Avenue and Highway 99 when she saw flames burst from the back of the vehicle. She called 911.

People yelled and honked at the driver to let him know his vehicle was on fire.

The man exited the car, looked at the flames, and then got back in.

A couple men helped the vehicle’s driver push the car out of the roadway and into a nearby parking lot. A man armed with a fire extinguisher helped douse the flaming car.

As firefighters reached the scene, the car “exploded with crazy flames and smoke.”

“I think he was fine,” Thatcher-Hughes said of the driver.

Thatcher-Hughes said her son, Kendrick Thatcher, 5, was “really excited.”

Dawn Johnson, the fire district’s spokeswoman, said the car’s owner recently had worked done on the engine.

“That’s where the fire was,” Johnson said.

She confirmed the man was not injured. The car, he told her, was valued at about $18,000, Johnson said.