Daniel Jones

CRESAPTOWN, Md. — Police credit the quick thinking of two bystanders with saving the life of a young woman in Maryland as her overturned vehicle filled with water after crashing into a creek.

Doug Widdows used a crowbar to break the car’s window and Daniel Jones crawled into the upside down Mustang in the middle of Warrior Run creek, where Jones cut the seatbelt and pulled the driver to safety.

“It was just something I did,” said Widdows, who lives just across the road from the creek.

“I always carry a knife in my pocket,” said Jones, who was traveling with his two children from their home in Frostburg, Maryland to Keyser, West Virginia, when he came upon the accident scene.

Sometime after 5 p.m. on Feb. 12, Savannah Long, of Keyser, West Virginia, 18, lost control of her car as she left Cresaptown, Maryland, heading toward nearby LaVale, Maryland on Winchester Road, according to the Allegany County Sheriff’s Office.

“I was watching a movie,” Widdows said, “and I heard tires squeal, but you always hear tires squeal here.”

But then Widdows heard a crash and, he said, did a double take.

His second look supported the first.

As she drove, Long’s Ford Mustang went off the right side of the road and flipped as it fell over a 10-foot stream bank.

The car ended up in the creek with its tires pointing straight up. Long was hanging upside down, secured in that position by a seatbelt.

Two swings of a crowbar

Long was trapped inside the vehicle as water began to flood the interior.

“I ran right over and could see that the water was just two inches from her headrest,” Widdows said. “I tried several times to open the door, but that didn’t work … Then I tried breaking the window with a rock, but that didn’t work either. Then somebody stopped who had a crowbar.”

Widdows said it took two swings and the window broke.

Enter Daniel Jones.

“I was coming into Cresaptown and there was a woman in the middle of the road screaming about someone being in the car in the creek,” Jones said.

With Jones were his 9-year-old son and 7-year-old daughter.

“I parked the car and ran over. Doug (Widdows) was just getting the driver’s window broken out so I laid down in the water and crawled inside and asked her if she was hurt. Then I reached in my pocket — I always carry a knife — and cut the seatbelt and pulled her out.”

Jones said, “We got her up onto the bank just about the time the EMS was getting there.”

Widdows said the car came to rest in a fortuitous location in the creek.

“Another 10 feet downstream, the water is a lot deeper,” he said.

The aftermath

Following the rescue, Long was taken to an area medical center to be examined as her rescuers returned to their prior activities.

“I think I was in the car like that for 5 to 7 minutes,” Long said. “I heard them tell me to hide my face because they were going to break the window.”

Long said her head remained above the flow of the stream, but her long hair reached into it and became wet.

“I was very cold,” she said.

After having her back X-rayed at the hospital, Long was released, she told the Cumberland, Maryland Times-News, adding that she was doing well.

Long said Tuesday evening she and her family are grateful that Widdows and Jones moved so quickly to help her, and that she had thanked them via Facebook.

Sharing in Long’s sentiments, authorities on site also applauded her rescuers for their efforts.

“The actions of Widdows and the other selfless individuals undoubtedly saved the life of Long,” said an investigating deputy who declined to be identified.

Sawyers writes for The Cumberland, Maryland Times-News.