‘It’s heartbreaking’: Regina family’s Christmas light show display damaged

Trevor Allen was at home Tuesday night when he heard a loud crash and looked out the window.

He saw a black truck backing off his front lawn in Lakeridge, where he had set up a large lighting display for his annual Christmas light show.

“A truck came down the street, slammed into the display and it looks like his back end slid around … and then (he) took off down the street,” Allen said Wednesday.

The light show on a corner lot on Genereux Drive consists of about 36,000 bulbs set on various displays which are carefully synchronized to music.

The truck destroyed a large portion of a picket fence, two mini trees, a sign, an arch, three power supply boxes and multiple cables that connect it all. Debris was sent from Allen’s lawn across his driveway and onto his neighbour’s lawn.

Tire tracks leading to the damaged Christmas light display on Genereux Drive in Regina on Dec. 4, 2019. (Andrew Shepherd/980 CJME)

The truck also struck a large rock, weighing more than 1,000 pounds, in the middle of his front lawn. Allen said the vehicle was travelling fast enough to move it back about four feet.

“There’s no way you could move that rock. I put it in place with my Bobcat and it was a struggle,” said Allen.

Two RCMP officers — Allen isn’t sure if they are serving or retired — happened to be parked nearby watching the show and witnessed the crash.

“They actually took off after the vehicle to try to catch it but they were not able to get close enough to get a plate because the person knew they were being followed and they took off,” said Allen.

Allen hopes the incident was not intentional. He’s not sure if someone was goofing around and lost control or if it was a stolen vehicle. He doesn’t expect the culprit to be found.

“It’s heartbreaking,” said Allen. “It takes a long time and there’s a lot of effort put into it. It’s just heart-wrenching knowing that somebody would do this.

Allen starts building the displays in January and begins setting up in August, including programming each and every light to match up with the music.

For every 10 seconds of music, it takes Allen eight hours of programming. This year’s Christmas light show runs 13 minutes. It’s a full-time job for Allen, who has been putting in 40 to 50 hours per week since August to get it all ready.

Allen loves lights. He started his own DJ company in high school just so he could put on light shows. Watching National Lampoon’s Christmas Vacation inspired him to use his passion to create his own lighting display at home.

He said he’s not so worried about the cost of the lights, which he gets from China and are fairly inexpensive.

“It’s the time and effort I put into it — the late nights, the tired days and non-stop goings. That’s what hurts the most,” said Allen.

Allen said the community loves his lighting display and he won’t let this hiccup take him down.

“I’m going to rebuild,” he said. “I’m hopefully going to have some of it back up by the weekend and I will have everything back up in the next few weeks. That’s my guarantee.”

You can learn more about Allen Family Lights and watch videos of his previous shows here.