Two men rescue driver from sinking vehicle in Bayfield Marina

Two Bayfield contractors share their experience after saving an elderly man from a vehicle that was accidentally driven into a marina last week.

Nick Schaufelberger and Zachary Zell had just started building a deck at a house in Bayfield, Ont., when they heard someone yell for help from the nearby marina.

They rushed to the scene on April 6 to find an SUV in the water, slowly sinking, with the elderly driver still in the driver’s seat.

“We’re both just working away and hear this guy call for help. We pull up and see a car floating here that had ripped through the fence. It was nuts. We obviously had to react,” recalled Zell.

Water was up to the driver’s knees by the time Schaufelberger and Zell arrived, they say. The driver’s foot was stuck under the gas pedal, which is what ended up sending his SUV careening through a fence, in reverse, landing on a wooden dock, before coming to rest in the water on the north side of the Bayfield Marina at around 8 a.m.

“He couldn’t figure out how to open the sunroof. So, I crawled into the passenger window and got his foot freed. And once I got down there, the water started coming in over the doors. And, I just said, ‘Buddy, it’s time to go, man,’” said Schaufelberger.

“We got on top. It was really slippery. We pulled him out of the sunroof. There’s another gentleman here, he was kind of trying to help us as well. And I’m just kind of hanging on, trying to make sure that we weren’t going to float away. I had to hold on to the dock as well…and help Nick pull him out, and then Nick just muscled him out. We got him on the dock, and then the ambulance and the police showed up,” said Zell, recounting the rescue.

“As soon as we pulled him out, the car was gone. Three, four, five seconds later, it was gone underwater. So yeah, it just all worked out. It was a pretty easy recovery, I’m grateful for that,” said Schaufelberger, who has some water rescue training as captain of Bluewater Rentals, his summer wake boating business.

Amazingly, the driver of the vehicle wasn’t injured, aside from a touch of hypothermia — and some mild embarrassment.

The elderly driver, who is in his 70s, and his rescuers have connected, and although he didn’t want to be a part of this story, Nick says the driver is so thankful, he and Zach heard his cries for help and were able to pull him from the frigid waters of the Bayfield Marina.

“It was gushing in pretty good. Like when I was in the car, I looked out the back window and you could see like the whole back window was underwater,” said Schaufelberger.

“And it was slippery too, because it was a cold morning. So, it’s like you’re trying to hold on, because like we’re starting to kind of cruise away. So, I’m kind of holding the dock so we’re not flying away, and then we’re all stuck out in the water,” said Zell.

The SUV was craned out of the water on April 8. The fence still has an SUV-sized hole in it, but all told, Monday’s rescue could have ended up being a tragic recovery mission, if not for Schaufelberger and Zell.

“I’m just glad we were here at the right time and able to help out. Because I knew I didn’t want to watch him just sink away and drown and deal with that. So yeah, I knew we were going in, no matter what,” added Schaufelberger.