MEDINA, Ohio — A group of neighbors in Medina say three people are lucky to be alive after we learned they were trying to clean out a clogged drain and ended up being trapped and sucked underneath it.
“I’ve never seen anything quite like that,” said David Knox.
For years, Knox said he and his neighbors knew the drain was getting worse, especially when it rains and gets backed up.
But he said they never expected that cleaning it out to prevent the private lake from flooding would almost cost people their lives.
"We almost lost two people today, but we didn’t, and we’re just lucky,” said Knox.
A video News 5 received from Andrew Arehart showed a team of first responders using rope to pull a man out of a private lake in the Twin Oaks neighborhood in Medina.
"One of them was pinned to the drain, and they just started shouting, 'Call 911, call 911,'” said Arehart.
As the trapped man waited to be rescued, Knox, who was there to clean out the drain, saw two men disappear underneath it.
"They literally were sucked under in the blink of an eye,” said Knox.
While waiting for rescue crews to respond, Knox said he went to the spot where the drain empties out into the creek and found the two men who had disappeared.
"They were holding onto the side of the bank, and the water was rushing by them next to them. We got a rope, lowered that down to them,” said Knox. “We tied that rope to a tree to secure them there.”
Eventually, Medina Fire Chief Larry Walters said multiple agencies arrived on Concord Drive at 6:44 p.m. Monday, just four minutes after the first call came in.
"We split up and got both victims tied off, secured and were able to pull them out pretty quickly,” said Walters. “I’m very impressed by the local neighborhood, and all of the folks that just immediately stopped what they were doing and jumped in to help.”
Walters said those rescued were taken to a local hospital, where they’re expected to be OK. Meantime, neighbors are hopeful the privately owned drain will get fixed soon.
"Two people almost died, yeah, it needs to be fixed,” said Arehart. “Thank God no one died.”
I did receive phone numbers from some of the people who were rescued, and I’m still waiting to hear back.
