A man awaiting rescue while trapped on a vehicle roof found himself swept downstream by a “raging torrent” before firefighters could rescue him, California officials say.
The swift current carried the car about one-eighth of a mile downstream before it hit a bank, allowing firefighters to rescue the man on Tuesday, Nov. 8, the San Bernardino County Fire District said in a news release.
A video with the release shows firefighters with safety lines pulling the man from the vehicle’s roof amid rushing flood waters.
He was not injured and declined to go to a hospital, firefighters said.
Heavy rain caused flooding across much of Southern California, and 911 callers alerted firefighters to the trapped vehicle in the Cajon Pass at 9:33 a.m., the release said.
By the time firefighters arrived, the man had climbed on top of his vehicle to escape the rising water, the release said.
“Heavy rainfall can cause normally dry washes and riverbeds to become raging torrents in a very short amount of time, and it only takes as little as 12 inches of moving water to move a vehicle,” firefighters wrote.
The Cajon Pass is a pass between the San Bernardino Mountains to the east and the San Gabriel Mountains to the west in Southern California.
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