It was a cold morning on Feb. 6 when Shedly Apollon, a 29-year old makeup artist, left her home in Port St. Lucie, Fla., to get a massage for her birthday, a gift from her fiancé.
It was meant to be an uneventful journey.
But by noon that day, one life had been saved, and another delivered.
“It’s now our birthday,” said Ms. Apollon, speaking in an interview on Friday about the memorable day she now shares with her newborn daughter, Ivory Atara Sully.
Ms. Apollon was just over 33 weeks pregnant when she set off for a prenatal treatment that her fiancé, Woodly Sully, a firefighter, had arranged well in advance of the expected due date of their baby on March 22.
Ms. Apollon set off before 8 a.m., with soup and water to stay hydrated. About 25 minutes into her trip, as she traveled along Interstate 95, she began to feel faint, and pulled over onto the shoulder.
She pulled back onto the highway, and in Martin County, she said she felt faint again and tried to stop to re-evaluate her condition.
“The car went too far over, and I ended up in the water,” she said. “I was halfway in. I looked back and forward,” she said, thinking: “I am in a lake.”
Her Honda started to sink. Water pooled around her feet, then her ankles.
Panicking, she called Mr. Sully, who was at work, telling him she was “in a lake” and unable to get out.
Water weighed against the door and seeped in up to her waist.
Ms. Apollon, who does not know how to swim, launched herself into the back seat as the vehicle tilted and sank, leaving only the back right door accessible.
By then Logan Hayes, a passerby, had jumped in to help.
“I was face to face with him,” she said. “He was saying, ‘Come to me.’”
Ms. Apollon said she lost consciousness, “but I knew someone was saving me.”
Mr. Hayes was treading water.
“He was dipping in and coming up for air, holding me by my waist,” Ms. Apollon said.
Mr. Hayes grabbed her.
“I knew immediately. I was like: ‘Oh my God. This lady is pregnant,” he told WPTV.
Mr. Hayes, who could not be immediately reached on Friday, hauled her to shore, about 30 feet away, and into the arms of others who had gathered to help. They called Mr. Sully, whose last message from Ms. Apollon was that she had become stranded in the water.
“The minute I got that call, I have location on my iPhone, I saw a lake around her,” Mr. Sully said. “I had no clue if anybody was saving her.”
He called State Highway Patrol, who informed him that it had other reports of her crash into what the authorities said was a pond.
“My heart got a little at ease,” he said.
Ms. Apollon was taken to HCA Florida Lawnwood Hospital in Fort Pierce, arriving as a trauma case at about 9 a.m. A team assembled, including doctors from the emergency room, neonatal and labor and delivery, and performed an emergency C-section.
The baby weighed less than 3 pounds. But both mother and daughter were alive.
At 12:19 p.m., Mr. Sully cut the cord.
“In the world of trauma, we see a lot of things,” Dr. David Rubay, chief of trauma at the hospital, said in an interview.
But the sinking car, water rescue, advanced pregnancy, emergency C-section and then the arrival of Ivory was “very unique,” he said.
Ivory is in the neonatal intensive care unit, where she is making progress and has gained weight.
“I am grateful that my girl is as strong as me,” Ms. Apollon said.
Christine Hauser is a Times reporter who writes breaking news stories, features and explainers.
The post After a Harrowing Water Rescue, Baby Is Delivered on Mother’s Birthday appeared first on New York Times.
