FORT WAYNE, Ind. — An officer with the Purdue University Fort Wayne Police Department was in the right place at the right time Tuesday night.
Officer Bre Wojnarowski told NBC affiliate WPTA she was called to respond to a child riding his bike in the ravine on Coliseum Boulevard.
Wojnarowski said she was the first officer at the scene and heard screaming near the river and discovered the child had fallen through the ice.
She ran through limbs and over logs and used her flashlight to locate the child.
“There was a quarter of a second where I was just terrified for him, but also the fact that I didn’t know if I could get to him in time. So just, terror,” Wojnarowski told WPTA.
Initially, Wojnarowski said she fell through the ice a couple of times before realizing how she could get to the child.
"After thinking for half a second, I realized, spread your weight out. So, I army-crawled to the child and finally got to him, and I was able to guide him out of the water," Wojnarowski told WPTA. "It’s cliché to say I was just doing my job, but in that moment, it was the job."
After the rescue, the heroic officer said she warmed up in an ambulance, changed into fresh clothes and went right back to work.
WPTA said the boy is expected to be OK.
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