Incidents of cars into buildings seems to be climbing in Columbus

COLUMBUS, Ohio (WCMH) -- Within the last month alone, NBC4 has reported on several cars crashing into buildings in Columbus, sparking a big discussion on social media. 

Columbus Police Sgt. James Fuqua shared statistics from the last three years. So far in 2025, 67 cars have crashed into buildings in Columbus. Last year, there were 226 of these incidents. In 2023, there were 161 cars into buildings, and in 2022, there were 166.  

"We're putting people in situations where they should never be, and you should never worry about sitting in a restaurant or in a business and having a car come through that restaurant and possibly through your table," Fuqua said.

Fuqua said there's no rhyme, reason, or consistency when it comes to these incidents. 

"When we did a deep dive into these numbers, it really doesn't matter geographically where this happens," Fuqua said. "It happens all over the city. It happens with young people. It happens with old people. It happens in the daytime as well as in the evening."

Fuqua said he's been to scenes where people were within inches of losing their lives due to cars going into structures. He said it's difficult to address the situation because it's so unique, but in the summer, Columbus police do step up patrols.

"We do start looking for more distracted driving throughout the summer just because windows are down," Fuqua said. "If people have convertibles, there's just so many more distractions just by the nature of how many more people are out and enjoying the nice weather."

The main thing Fuqua wants to stress to drivers is to not drive distracted.

"We know that people are addicted to their phones, whether it's a text message or answering a call," Fuqua said. "In some cases, we've caught people watching video while they're driving their actual car and these are some of the contributing factors that we know that can be prevented from this happening outside of, you know, other factors."

Fuqua said it's also important to make sure your car is in good mechanical working condition. 

"Unfortunately, there are times when looking at these reports that people's brakes have legitimately went out or some other factor to their vehicle that was faulty at the time that caused them not to be able to correct themselves before they went into a building," Fuqua said.

Fuqua said we also can't ignore the large number of car break-ins in the city.

"Because, unfortunately, some of these cars into buildings are a result of typically young people who are driving in stolen cars and joyriding and don't even have a valid driver's license and recklessly crashing, not necessarily intentionally, but because they don't have a license and they shouldn't be driving," Fuqua said.

Ultimately, though, Fuqua said it's still too early to tell how the numbers will shake out this year compared to years past.

"I would love to say that I hope that we do not surpass those numbers, but it is getting warmer, and traffic does increase as the season goes on and the warmer months are out there, meaning people are traveling in their cars more," Fuqua said.

Fortunately, Fuqua said most of these incidents tend to be fairly minor with very few fatalities. He attributes a lot of this to the technology in cars nowadays and the safety measures they have in place.