JACKSON COUNTY, Ind. — An Indiana woman is sharing her firsthand account of a terrifying situation of floodwaters filling her car and the deputy who saved her life.
Freezing cold floodwaters nearly swallowed an SUV just south of Seymour on Jan. 13. In the vehicle was Jen Colvin, who was fighting to escape the rising waters.
"You don't have any idea how terrifying that is to know that you're stuck and that there's nothing you can do," Colvin said as tears fell down her cheeks.
Colvin said she was on her way to deliver a DoorDash order Saturday night before her car slid into a ditch. Next thing she knew, water began to creep in at her feet.
"I called 911 and told the lady on the phone, I was like, 'I'm trapped in my car, and there's water coming in, and she was like, 'How much water?' and I was like, 'I was up to my knees by then," Colvin recalled.
That's when Colvin said she made her way to the back of her car. The water was now at her neck and the worst-case scenarios going through her mind.
"That I'm never going to see my kids again. I was never going to see my husband again. I was never going to see my mom and dad. That I wasn't going to be able to tell anyone goodbye. And that no one was going to be able to find me," Colvin said as she continually choked up at the thoughts.
But someone did find her and just so happened to be Jackson County Sheriff's Deputy Mark Holt, who was off-duty.
"You know, I just happened to be in that right place at the right time, and everything worked out, too, putting me there at that particular time," Holt said.
Both Holt and Colvin called it divine intervention. But whatever you want to call it, Colvin needed to get out of the car and fast.
"I heard her banging on the window and screaming. So I jumped in, and it was immediately up above my waist," Holt said.
The deputy was able to pull Colvin to safety.
And as Colvin rocked in her recliner Tuesday, she can't help but think the woman on her necklace, her grandmother, sent Holt her way.
"I've always had this big belief that people have a way of coming back to us, and earlier that day, I saw a red cardinal. And they say if you see a cardinal, it's a visitor from heaven. I honestly believe it was somebody. Maybe that bird went to that ... saw that police officer and sent him to me," Colvin said.
