Motorbike crash through gas station shop tied to suspicious house fire

The police believe that a motorcycle crashing into a Shell gas station store next to the highway near Elst and a house fire in the nearby Huissen are linked. The motorcycle rider was seriously hurt in the crash and taken to hospital, the Gelderland police said on Twitter.

The crash happened at around 5:00 a.m., according to Tubantia. The motorcycle rider crashed into the shop of the Shell gas station on the A325 near Elst. An ambulance rushed the seriously injured driver to the Radboudumc in Nijmegen.

Ten minutes earlier, the fire department responded to a fire at a home in Huissen - around a 15 minute drive from the gas station. The situation in the burning home on Nijverheidsstraat seemed suspicious, so the police cordoned off the area - evacuating three nearby homes and barring access to surrounding businesses - and called in the Ministry of Defense's explosive disposal unit.

It took several hours for the area to be secured well enough that it was safe for the police forensics investigators to enter the home, which did not happen until about noon. It was not clear whether any explosives were actually found. No victims were found in the burning home. The area was still cordoned off to give forensic investigators space to do their work.

It was not immediately clear how police were connecting the two incidents. Local news outlet Tubantia speculated that the home may belong to the motorcycle rider who crashed into the gas station.