Authorities are searching for a driver who crashed a U-Haul van into a lake in Plantation while fleeing from police Thursday morning, officials said.
Aerial footage showed the van partially in the water around 6:30 a.m., with a large group of officers and police vehicles in a nearby parking lot.
According to Plantation Police, officers responded to reports of a person sleeping in the van just before 6 a.m. in the 8000 block of Cleary Boulevard. The person inside fled the scene in the van.
Surveillance footage showed the moment officers confronted the man in the van and shows him waking up and driving off, running over two poles.
Get South Florida local news, weather forecasts and entertainment stories to your inbox. Sign up for NBC South Florida newsletters.
The van struck two other vehicles and crashed through a barricade, leaving the area before officers lost sight of it, officials said. Officers eventually found the van with its front end partially submerged in the lake in a gated community, but it was unoccupied.
A man who said he found the man sleeping in the van said he called 911 almost immediately.
Local
"I knocked on his window and he didn’t budge. I noticed there was a gun in his lap so I went in the house and called the police," said the man, who didn't want to be identified.
Police said they're still searching for the driver.
