‘Hero’ coach drowns saving child after football practice, Tennessee police say
A flag football coach died Tuesday, Aug. 9, in Tennessee after trying to rescue a child who fell into a drainage ditch, police say.
Germantown police and firefighters responded at 6:17 p.m. to reports that a child had fallen into the storm drain at Riverdale Park, according to a police news release.
The child’s father and his football coach, Horace William Drennan, had gone into the culvert in to rescue him. When police arrived, they say, the boy and his father had emerged on the other side of the drainage pipe, according to the news release.
Drennan had not.
When first responders located Drennan, 37, they transported him to Methodist Le Bonheur Germantown Hospital where he was pronounced dead, authorities said. The boy who fell in the water and his father had no serious injuries.
Matt Young told Fox 13 Memphis that Drennan was his friend, and that the coach leaves behind a 6-year-old son who was also at the park that evening.
“He did it in instinct because I know Will,” Young told Fox 13. “It’s just heartbreaking. But he’s a true hero in every sense of the word.”
Police told McClatchy News this is an ongoing investigation.
Germantown is about 22 miles southeast of Memphis.
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