Fast-Moving Water Had NC Crews Rescuing Same Truck Twice

Feb. 8, 2020

After a rescue an hour earlier, Huntersville firefighters saved the pickup truck again after flooding swept it through a culvert under Interstate 77 about a mile away on the other side of the highway.

By Lauren Lindstrom

Source The Charlotte Observer

Huntersville, NC, firefighters saved the same pickup truck twice Thursday after fast-moving floodwaters swept the vehicle through a culvert a mile away from the first rescue.

Huntersville firefighters were scratching their heads Thursday when they checked on the blue pick-up submerged in water.

The truck looked familiar, they realized, because they’d already rescued it an hour earlier.

As severe weather brought high wind, rain, flooding, and a tornado to the Charlotte area, the Huntersville Fire Department responded to a water rescue on northbound Interstate 77 near Gilead Road shortly before 12:30 pm.

There they found the uninjured driver already out of the truck, which had slid down an embankment and was partially submerged. Officials couldn’t immediately get the vehicle removed, so the plan was for the truck to sit there for a while until the storm passed.

Or so they thought.

An hour later firefighters responded to a call for another submerged vehicle, this time on southbound I-77 near Mount Holly Huntersville Road. Bystanders reported a possible trapped driver. Huntersville called in backup from the Charlotte Fire Department to remove the truck, which turned out to be empty.

“It looks like the same truck that was on the other side of the highway,” public information officer Bill Suthard recalled of the rescuers’ realization. “It’s crazy, it took a while of us scratching our heads.”

Officials believe the truck was swept through a culvert under I-77, where it reemerged about a mile away on the other side of the highway.

Suthard said he was thankful that neither incident injured any first responders.

Though the storms have cleared the area, Suthard asked motorists to be cautious and avoid driving through standing water or around barricades marking closed roads.

He said he expects additional flooding in the coming days, and as little as an inch or two of water can sweep away a vehicle, especially when it’s fast-moving.

“I don’t care if you’re in a 4x4 (vehicle), a fire truck or school bus,” he said. “A car is not a boat.”

This work was made possible in part by grant funding from Report for America/GroundTruth Project and the Foundation For The Carolinas.

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