5 July 2023
WICHITA, Kan. (KSNW) — A car landed in the rushing water of a Wichita creek Wednesday morning, and the Wichita Fire Department raced to rescue the person they thought was inside it.
Someone called 911 to report the vehicle in the water, and dispatchers notified the fire department of a possible submersion in the 2700 block of South Roosevelt.
Water rescue crews and divers. They found the car on the side of Gypsum Creek. Rescuers got in the water to check for people who may have been trapped in the vehicle or who might be in the water. They did not find anyone.
The fire department said there was a language barrier with the person who reported the car in the water.
“We understood that there was somebody in the vehicle. Hence the heavy response,” Battalion Chief Lane Pearman, WFD, said. “But after questioning and requestioning, it was determined that nobody was in the vehicle, but that was after we had already searched the vehicle.”
“What had happened was the calling party didn’t place their vehicle into park, and the vehicle rolled into the creek north of Pawnee, so quite a distance … and then floated down to where you see it there,” he said.
Pearman said the driver left the house just in time to see the car floating away.
“It made it through the two bridges and ended up getting stuck on the rocks.”
He said this is a good example of how quickly water can move a heavy car.
“I mean, that vehicle, probably close to 3,000 pounds or more, was swept downstream a good a quarter mile or more.”
Pearman said the rescuers got an unexpected chance to practice a swift water rescue.
“Because it’s so flat in and around Wichita, the only time that we’re able to do any swift water training is actually when we have swift water such as this,” he said. “We usually do that kind of training on the river.”
“It sounds like over the next three days, we could receive several more inches of rain, so we could very well have additional incidents like this or similar to this,” Pearman said.
His recommendation to drivers is if a roadway is flooded, do not go through it, don’t even try.