by A 3-year-old girl was found clinging to her mother by rescue crews in Beaumont, Texas. The girl’s mother, 41-year-old Colette Sulcer fought to save her daughter’s life after the two got swept away by waters rushing from a drainage canal, say police.
Authorities said Sulcer was traveling down an Interstate 10 service road on Tuesday when she ran into trouble. Her vehicle hit high waters and with powerful wind gusts and torrential rains, she pulled into a nearby parking lot and got trapped. After fleeing their car, Sulcer and her daughter were swept away by the floodwaters.
Rescuers spotted the mother face down in the water and the girl clinging to her back. “The first responders got to the mother and child just before they went under a trestle,” said police in a statement. “Water was up to the trestle and first responders would not have been able to save the child if they had floated under it.”
They pulled them into the boat but could not resuscitate Sulcer, who was unconscious. First responders took turns performing CPR until they could get her to an ambulance. “Water was still high so a citizen helped by allowing first responders to load the mother and daughter in his truck and brought them all to a waiting ambulance,” said authorities.
Sulcer never regained consciousness. Her daughter was suffering from hypothermia and taken to hospital where she is in stable condition and being cared for by relatives.
“It’s a true testament of a mother’s will to sacrifice her life to keep her child alive,” Officer Haley Morrow, a Beaumont police spokeswoman, told The Washington Post on Wednesday.
At least 30 people have died in the Hurricane Harvey. The storm is currently making its second landfall.
