AASHTO Journal - Arizona DOT Workers Save Woman from Drowning

Quick thinking workers at the Arizona Department of Transportation maintenance yard in Gila Bend saved a woman in early August from certain drowning in a nearby canal by forming a human chain to pull her to safety.

[Above photo by Arizona DOT]

According to the Maricopa County Sheriff’s Office, the 58-year-old woman slipped and fell into the canal one evening and spent a frightening night clinging to a floating tire by a railroad track embankment in the swift canal current; managing to stay out of the underground tunnel that transits the water to the other side of the embankment.

“It’s swift water and you could get pulled under the railroad tracks,” explained Ray Ruiz, one of the Arizona DOT workers who eventually rescued the stranded woman, in a statement. “Basically, it’s a siphon.”

Early that morning, Ruiz and five of his coworkers – John Gardner, Antonio Trejo Martinez, Salvador Mata Jr., Larry Ortega, and David Robledo, all highway maintenance technicians – heard the woman’s calls for help and jumped into vehicles to follow the sound. They discovered her struggling in the canal, clinging to a tire and desperately trying to stay afloat after 18-hours in the water.

In minutes, the six Arizona DOT workers linked arms to form a human chain, extended a shovel to the stranded woman, and successfully pulled her to safety.

[Editor’s note: A local TV news channel interviewed the men to get more details about their life-saving rescue.]

Once the woman was out of the water, one employee gave her his shirt so she’d have something dry to wear. When deputies with the Maricopa County Sheriff’s Office arrived and took over, all six Arizona DOT maintenance technicians went back to their regular duties.

Many state department of transportation workers across the country have stepped in to help save lives in critical situations.

For example, in February, a three-man Illinois Department of Transportation work crew rescued a motorist from a burning pickup truck right before the vehicle was consumed by the flames.

In the wake of a major January 2024 ice storm, Jake Jensen – a maintenance coordinator for the Oregon Department of Transportation – became an unlikely hero as he almost single-handedly cut through toppled trees that had blocked and trapped motorists on two major rural roadways in Lane County.

Also in January 2024, a North Carolina Department of Transportation ferry crew rescued two hunters and their dog in danger of drowning at sea after their boat overturned.

And in November 2023, a New Hampshire Department of Transportation crew and team of contractors found themselves in the right place at the right time to save a man from drowning in the bone-chilling waters of Lake Winnipesaukee near the town of Alton.