Car 'bobsleds' through mudflow on streets of Burbank

BURBANK, Calif. (FOX 11/ AP) - Burbank Firefighters Local 778 captured wild video of a car sliding down a street in Burbank during the mudslide this week.

The fire department posted the video to Instagram writing, "Urban Prius bobsledding in Burbank!"

It was before 6am Tuesday morning when Desionne Franklin realized he and his girlfriend needed to get out. Fast.

“I could hear a rumbling and the rain was coming down hard and I said ‘we gotta go now.”

Franklin and his girlfriend jumped in his Prius but before they could make it down Country Club Road the mud caught up with them. It picked up their car and carried it down the hill.

“The steering wheel was shaking and we could feel boulders and rocks underneath us,” said Franklin. “The brakes didn’t work. My girlfriend was screaming ‘go go go.”

A member of the Burbank Fire Department caught it all on camera. In a video that’s now gone viral you can see their Prius surfing down the mudslide.

“What you can’t see in that video is the panic inside,” says Franklin who uses his car to work as a rideshare driver at night. “We know we are lucky this turned out to be a positive story.”

At least one other resident of Country Club Road had her car carried away too but luckily she wasn’t inside it. Wendy Peters’ car was parked near her home when it was picked up and carried off. On Thursday her and her mother found her Scion at the bottom of the canyon and spent the day digging out the mud that filled it to the top. Her mother’s car was swept away too but they haven’t found it.

Authorities issued evacuation orders on Tuesday after waves of mud from hills swept down County Club Drive in the Los Angeles foothill suburb. A fire there last year has left the steep hills and canyons bare of brush that would help stabilize the soil.