RUMFORD – A young Rumford woman and her infant child were lucky to be alive after the car she was driving plunged into a brook Tuesday night on South Rumford Road.
Susan Jamison, 19, who suffered neck and shoulder injuries, and hypothermia, was taken by Med-Care ambulance to Rumford Hospital, said investigating Sgt. George Cayer. She was treated and released.
It was not immediately known if the baby was also taken to the hospital, because, Cayer said, the child’s father took the baby home from the scene.
“It’s a miracle they got out of there alive! They were very, very lucky,” Cayer said Tuesday night.
He said Jamison was driving west at 5:10 p.m. on South Rumford Road in a 2002 Oldsmobile sedan that had been purchased about two days prior.
Jamison, he said, reported there was a black truck on her side of the road, which is near the Route 232 junction.
She reportedly tried to avoid the truck, got caught in slush along the side of the road, overcorrected, and rolled over the snow-covered guardrail, dropping nose first about 20 feet down into the brook, Cayer said.
“She said the car rolled once, but from what I saw, it appeared that the vehicle launched over the guardrails, and dropped nose down into the brook, breaking through the ice and into a good 4 to 5 feet of water,” he said.
The car then spun 180 degrees on its nose and dropped down into the water, facing in the opposite direction that it had been traveling, he said.
Rumford Deputy Fire Chief Ben Byam said the car was submerged when he arrived, with about a foot of the roof visible above the water.
“The front of the car was completely submerged and there was water past the steering wheel and in the back seat where the baby was, but just underneath the child seat,” Cayer said.
Jamison, he said, rolled a passenger side window down and escaped with the baby.
“She did a very good job getting herself and the child out of there in water that was up to her chest when she laid the dry baby on the embankment to pull herself up. She’s a very courageous girl,” Cayer said.
Passerby Clarence Allen of South Paris, a Verizon employee, saw Jamison climbing up the snow-covered cement abutment and onto the road with the baby and stopped to help, Cayer said.
Cayer credited Allen, who called in the wreck, with keeping Jamison and the baby warm.
“He did a real good job comforting her and watching out for her until we got there,” Cayer said.
Rumford firefighters shut down South Rumford Road and directed traffic while crewmen from Adley’s Wrecker Service and Dan’s Automotive worked for almost two hours to bring the totaled car up to the road, Cayer said.
“The Fire Department did an excellent job of lowering ladders down into the brook to help them get chains down there to get the car out,” he added.
Also assisting were Rumford patrolmen Paul Casey and Douglas Maifeld.
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