Calif freeway standoff reaches foamy end

PALO ALTO, Calif., July 5 (UPI) -- A squad of SWAT officers brought a four-hour standoff on a Northern California highway to a foamy end Friday when they flushed a motorist out of his disabled car with a flood of firefighting foam.

Authorities had feared that the unidentified driver had poured gasoline on himself inside the maroon Oldsmobile and might set himself on fire, so they devised a plan in which SWAT officers from the San Mateo County Sheriff's Office moved in on the vehicle with two fire hoses and unleashed a torrent of foam from both sides that virtually filled the vehicle with the fire-suppressing suds.

"As far as we know, the driver is OK and no SWAT officers were hurt," a California Highway Patrol spokesman told reporters on southbound Highway 101 near Palo Alto.

The incident began around 4:30 a.m. PDT when a CHP officer noticed the car with Tennessee plates parked on the side of Interstate 580 in Livermore. When the officer pulled over to investigate, the car sped off and began a high-speed pursuit.

The chase reached speeds of 100 miles per hour and was brought to an end when the fleeing car ran over a spike strip that punctured at least two tires. The driver kept going for a few more miles, driving on the rims until he ground to a halt in the middle of 101 as traffic backed up some eight miles.

There was initial concern that the driver had another person in the car with him, possibly a hostage. The driver's identity and the reason he tried to elude police was not immediately known.