Car strikes Eden home; no one hurt

  A two-vehicle accident caused one car to hit a house on Patterson Street in Eden about 3:15 Wednesday afternoon.
  Mark Martin, of 515 Patterson St., received a call at work that a car hit his house. When he arrived, he found a 1989 Honda in his front room.
  Jason Mays, a patrol officer with Eden police, said Jessica Arnold, who was driving a 2000 Pontiac, pulled onto Patterson Street from Lawson Street. She did not see the Honda driven by Herculano Ramirez until the Pontiac struck the right rear side of the Honda.
  “The force of it pushed Mr. Ramirez’s car into the house on Patterson,“ Mays said.
  Two people were in the home; 72 year-old Billy Martin was sitting on the couch eating lunch, and Shannon Powell was in a back room.
  “Boom! That was all I heard. At first I thought Mr. Martin had fallen, but whatever it was jarred the bathroom door,“ Powell said. “When I ran into the living room, it was full of smoke.“
  Powell’s first concern was to get Martin, who has had a triple bypass and is a recent widower, out of the smoke and settled and call 911. Meanwhile, neighbors helped Ramirez, who, Mays said, was not seriously injured, out of his car.
  When Mark Martin arrived to inspect his house, he found a few broken wind chimes, the antique park bench that sat on his front porch in pieces, and the Honda snuggled against the front of the house.
  “I guess it could have been worse,“ Martin said. “That nearly scared me to death, and I know it shook Daddy up.“
  Walking over to the front windows, most unbroken but now hanging at an odd angle and sunlight peeking out from where the floor separated from the wall, he added, “Nothing we can’t fix.“   
  Mays said Martin’s father and Ramirez were taken to Morehead Memorial Hospital.