Woman was submerged in car when cop arrived, armed with a hammer, Indiana police say

Dawson White

A woman in Indiana is safe after a police officer used a hammer to rescue her from a submerged car, police say.

Indiana State Police Sergeant Stephen Wheeles was helping out at another location on Friday when he heard a call about a crash on a road north of Seymour, police said in a news release. Dispatch said a woman was trapped in her car in the water.

Police in Indiana say an officer rescued a woman from a submerged car.
Police in Indiana say an officer rescued a woman from a submerged car.

Wheeles arrived to find the car partially submerged and sinking with driver Megan Fleetwood, 23, still stuck inside, the release said.

The pond was between six and eight feet deep, KCRA reported.

“All I could see was the rear window and the trunk of the car and she’s crawled in the backseat and she’s at the rear window, so that’s the only window above water,” Wheeles told WKRC.

Wheeles hopped in the water and asked someone to hand him a hammer he’d spotted nearby, police say. He used the hammer to smash out the back window of Fleetwood’s car.

“When I hit that window, the window literally exploded,” Wheeles said told KCRA.

Police Sergeant Stephen Wheeles rescued a woman from a submerged car, police say.
Police Sergeant Stephen Wheeles rescued a woman from a submerged car, police say.

He then grabbed Fleetwood and pulled her out of the car, police say.

“To say Friday was the scariest day of my life is a complete understatement,” Fleetwood told KCRA, adding that the experience was particularly terrifying because she doesn’t know how to swim.

Both were transported to the hospital, Wheeles with hand and arm injuries, police say. Fleetwood suffered a concussion and both have been released, but not before realizing they knew each other from church, WKRC reported.

Seymour is roughly 60 miles south of Indianapolis.