SAN ANTONIO --
Hours of training and some heavy-duty equipment are what rescuers said enabled them to save a teenager dangling from a sport utility vehicle on Friday.
Firefighters and other rescuers saved 18-year-old James Tooley from a mangled SUV that became trapped between Interstate 35 and Interstate 37.
An animation that re-enacted the crash revealed that Tooley lost control on an entrance ramp and slid along a guard rail.
The SUV then fell over and became lodged between two highways.
Police said the vehicle would have plummeted further had it not become lodged.
Firefighter said the SUV's bizarre position made it a dangerous rescue.
"There's always a danger," Mario Nerio, a long-time member of the rescue team, said. "We have to plan for that."
First they secured the SUV with two heavy-duty chains, Nerio said.
The first chains went around the frame to the guardrail while the second chains were connected to the jaws of life, Nerio said.
Nerio said instead of removing Tooley from the vehicle, they removed pieces of the wreckage with the jaws of life.
Nerio said the procedure was safer because it didn't jostle the vehicle and endanger Tooley.
Nerio said they had to be careful because they knew that any moment the SUV could fall with them inside.
