Officer Pulled Unconscious Driver From Burning Car After Route 22 Crash in New Jersey

A Bridgewater police officer pulled an unconscious driver from a burning car after a sedan struck the rear of a tanker truck on U.S. Route 22 in New Jersey, an overnight crash that left the two vehicles fused together and briefly turned the highway into a moving fire scene.

The collision was reported at about 2:11 a.m. on March 5, 2025, near the Thompson Avenue exit ramp in Bridgewater. According to police and contemporaneous local reporting, the tanker had just left a Speedway gas station when the Hyundai Elantra struck its rear while both vehicles were traveling west.

The impact ignited both vehicles. Bridgewater police said the sedan and tanker traveled approximately 685 feet while attached and burning before the tanker driver brought the combination to a controlled stop on the shoulder.

The truck driver, identified in police accounts as Zachary J. Roslin, and the sedan’s passenger, Moosade Z. Harris, were able to get out on their own. The sedan’s driver, Peter J. Della-Ventura, remained unconscious and trapped behind the wheel.

Officer Noah Allatt arrived while the vehicles were still on fire. Body-camera footage released by police shows him moving toward the sedan, reaching inside, and pulling the driver away from the burning wreckage. Firefighters and emergency medical crews from the area then helped secure the scene and treat the occupants.

Della-Ventura and Harris were taken to Robert Wood Johnson University Hospital in New Brunswick with injuries described in contemporaneous reports as non-life-threatening. The tanker driver was also able to leave the crash area without being trapped inside his vehicle.

The sequence matters because the danger was not limited to the initial impact. The vehicles continued moving after the collision, caught fire, and remained physically connected. By the time Allatt reached the sedan, the driver was not in a position to escape without assistance. A rescue that lasted only moments unfolded amid fuel, flames, traffic hazards and unstable wreckage.

The cause of the crash remained under investigation in the original police and news reports, and no charges had been filed at that time. That distinction is important: the rescue was documented and publicly praised, but the available records do not establish why the sedan struck the tanker or whether investigators later concluded that any driver violated the law.

Bridgewater officials later gave the incident a second chapter. Township records say Allatt received the mayor’s inaugural Award for Exceptional Public Service, while the police department presented him with a valor award. The official recognition focused on the same fact captured in the emergency response: he entered a burning vehicle and removed an unconscious driver before the fire consumed the car.

The episode is therefore both a rescue story and a reminder of how quickly a highway crash can escalate. The first confirmed facts are straightforward: a rear-end collision, two burning vehicles, one trapped driver and an officer who reached him in time. The unanswered question is what caused the collision in the first place.