What started as a drive to get gas ended with an 84-year-old Regina woman being pulled through an SUV sunroof after the vehicle slid into a slough near Craven, Sask.

Marjorie Flavel said the men who rescued her should get “an award for bravery” after they helped her and her dog out of the sinking vehicle on July 5.

Matt Mario said he and his father were driving on Highway 20 to get gas in Craven when they came across multiple cars stopped near Riverside Sausages, about 2.5 kilometres northwest of Craven.

Mario said people at the scene had spotted the SUV in the water with a woman inside and called 911 at about 12:45 p.m. CST.

He said he wanted to jump in to rescue the woman and her little dog, but was told the 911 dispatcher wanted people to wait for police to arrive.

“Which makes sense because they don’t want other injuries and stuff like that. So we waited around a bit, and then we watched it probably submerge another foot when we were standing there.”

Mario said his father then told him to go into the water and help.

“The water was about up to my chest. You could walk on [the bottom], but it was like quicksand down there, so you couldn’t stand for awhile or else you could potentially get stuck in there.”

Mario said he swam to the SUV and checked the doors, but they were locked and Flavel could not unlock them.

He climbed onto the vehicle and got Flavel to try opening the sunroof. He said it worked.

“She was pretty scared, so I calmed her down and tried to use as much as I could to keep her calm and say, ‘We’re not leaving you here … you’re coming with us,’” he recalled.

Flavel first handed her dog, Angel, to Mario, who then helped her out.

“She still had her seatbelt on because she was just in shock a little bit. So I got her to take her seatbelt off and helped her out of the vehicle,” Mario said.

“It was a very tight space in that sunroof. So it was kind of tough to get her out. But I got her out, got her sitting on the roof.”

Mario said another bystander, Alex Agari, then joined him and both men helped Flavel into the water.

“She was terrified of the water, can’t swim. So she was very scared about that,” Mario said.

“And I said, ‘You wrap your arms around me, like, whatever you need to do.’ I held her hand the whole way and got her back to shore.”

Flavel said being rescued before emergency crews arrived was “such a relief.”

After she got back to shore, Flavel said she spoke with the 911 dispatcher.

“They wanted to send an ambulance and I said no,” she said. “I said I didn’t get hurt so they didn’t need to send an ambulance. I’m like, at least it wasn’t a hearse,” she said, laughing.

Flavel later posted about the rescue on Facebook. She said someone who works for Mario recognized him from the post and told her his name.

Mario then found Flavel on Facebook and connected with her. Flavel said she made plans to meet Mario and Agari for lunch over the weekend.

“Both of them are my angels and heroes,” Flavel said. “So they should be awarded with the hero [medal] because they were tremendous.”

With files from Joelle Seal

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