Woman Rescued From Maryland Flooding Thanks to Human Chain

Woman Rescued From Maryland Flooding Thanks to Human Chain

At least four men created a human chain to rescue a woman from a car being swept away by Maryland floodwater in an astonishing sight that was caught on camera.Dave Dester was filming the heroics of good Samaritans as they rescued a woman trapped in her car Saturday night when water raged in the streets of Ellicott City.He told Inside Edition that he feared the drama was going to end in tragedy."I thought she was gonna die," he claimed.Dester and his wife, Sara Arditti, own an art gallery in the town and watched as the floods ran in front of their door.One man who led the pack to save the woman was pushed down by the wild water as it raged in the street. He eventually got back up and led the chain to save the trapped woman. As the woman in the small convertible struggled to get out of the car, the men linked arms to save her."She was scared. She thought that if she stepped out of that car she would get swept up in that river that was formerly Main Street, Dester said. Dester says the woman was shaken but unharmed.

One of the heroes who stepped in to help, Jason Barnes, was getting ready to close up his nearby store when the floodwaters started raging outside, according to relatives. In the video, he is seen lifting the woman off the car so she could make her way up the chain, and both were later pulled to safety. A family member is now raising money on a Gofundme page to help him following the storm.

Arditti said that town was shaken up by broken gas lines that caused leaks and poles with live wires that fell into the rapid river as it developed in the streets."We are lucky our town didn't blow up," her husband said. A state of emergency was declared in Maryland after torrential rain hit the East Coast over the weekend.Two people were killed in the nightmare floods — a 35-year-old Pennsylvania woman and a 38-year-old Maryland man — after their vehicles were overcome with floodwater.Several homes and business in the area suffered major damage caused by the rain and flooding.