A South Carolina police chase is going viral for all the wrong reasons after cops engaged in a pursuit at a snail’s pace.
On June 15, the police chased a tractor excavator down a main highway at speeds of 3 miles per hour – the average walking speed of a human.
According to NBC, police investigating a separate incident saw the vehicle go across U.S. Highway 78 at 3:30 AM.
Just minutes later, they received a burglary call from a business after an alarm went off. When officers showed up, they found the front of the establishment wrecked and the man driving the excavator was accused of causing the destruction.
3MPH police chase has cops apprehend excavator driver
In the dashcam video of the incident, police crawled toward the excavator with multiple cars in pursuit.
Despite the blaring sirens and calls for the driver to pull over, the chase continued for over an hour, with the cops forced to stop several times in order to not pass.
Eventually, the excavator drove onto the Charleston County Fairgrounds property and got stuck. The 53-year-old driver tried to make a run for it, but he was followed by a drone and police dog with a handler who later apprehended him.
Kxan reports that Johnny Mesa was arrested and charged with failure to stop for a blue light, malicious injury to real property, and malicious injury to real property enhancement. He remained in the Charleston County jail on a $22,000 bond.
This isn’t the first time a weird police chase has made headlines. Earlier this year, a 19-year-old gun-wielding Utah man excitedly declared he was “in GTA” while filming himself leading police on a wild chase. He eventually escaped after changing his car’s color, but was subsequently arrested after clips of the chase were posted to social media.