"I think it took me maybe less than five minutes, but of course at the time it felt like two hours," the brave mom said.
Editor’s note: This article was originally published on October 31, 2019. It has since been updated.
Mothers are the superheroes of our lives and not every mother gets her due. They don't have to be extraordinary women to unbelievable things for their children, like wading through an icy pond to save their child. When their child is in danger, their parental instincts just kick and they turn into brave saviors with no fear of danger.
Ashley Holland, a Nova Scotia mom who was driving her 4-year-old daughter for a birthday party, was finding it hard to cope with the difficult weather. The winter storm had covered the entire street in snow and in a rather unfortunate moment, Ashley's car slid on the black ice and she lost control. The car started fishtailing as it continued to slide towards the pond by the road, reported THE STAR.
Before they knew what was happening, the car flipped over into the semi-frozen water body, with her daughter strapped in the passenger seat as the car remained submerged partly.
Recalling the fearful moments right before the car slid in, the mom said, "(I was) terrified. I’ve never been in a car accident before, ever, so I was just thinking, ‘Oh my God, the water is right there,’ and I was just like literally praying ‘Do not go in the water. But then we hit the water, so my only concern was just to get her out of the vehicle," she added.
"When something like that happens, it's like your parental instincts just kick in, right? And you do what you need to do to get your child to safety," the terrified mom told CBC Radio's Mainstreet.
Being like a fiercely protective mom that she was, she wasted no time in being anxious. She was determined to bring her daughter to safety, so she managed to unbuckle herself and crawled out of the car through the front passenger-seat window, and then swam to the surface.
She tried over and over to open the back door but her hands were too slippery. So the courageous mom went back inside the car that was still nearly submerged underwater and unbuckled her daughter's car seat with difficulty.
"She was screaming, she kept saying ‘Mom, I’m gonna die, I’m gonna die,’ and it was horrible," said the mother. No mom would ever want to hear their child scream those words ever.
Finally, she managed to unbuckle the strap and get Macy out of the car, left with no choice but to plunge into freezing water to get to safety. Holding her daughter as high as possible she swam back to the bank. "So from the waist down she was soaked, but I mean her hair didn't even get wet and I don't know how I did it," she said.
"I think it took me maybe less than five minutes, but of course at the time it felt like two hours. It was kind of a race to get her out," the hero mother said.
Soon after, they hailed down an approaching car and got inside it to get warm. Meanwhile, Captain Ryan Richard of the Brooklyn Volunteer Fire Department saw the top of the car in the water and turned around.
Richard wasn't even sure what he was looking at when he decided to make the turn, but it was for the best because the mother and daughter were showing signs of hypothermia when the firefighters checked their vital signs. They gave them warm clothes, a blanket, and even shoes to keep them warm. An ambulance showed up soon and took them to the hospital.
"How they were even able to get out of that car was a miracle," said Richard. "To be able to swim to shore and get up over that embankment is totally unheard of. I'll be honest with you, in my last 26 years I've been to many similar incidents and unfortunately they're usually very fatal," he added. This mom was not just lucky but exceptionally strong to have beaten fate and gotten her child and herself back to safety.
References:
https://www.cbc.ca/News/Canada/Nova-Scotia/Car-Crash-Rescue-Emergency-1.4987135
https://www.thestar.com/halifax/2019/01/21/mom-im-gonna-die.html
