Hero cops save woman

Published: March 8, 2007 | 5733rd good news item since 2003

An OPP officer secured his partner with rope to prevent them from falling as they clung to a young woman in a dramatic rush-hour rescue on an overpass over Hwy. 401.

“This is not something we do every day,” said Sgt. Tom Kaudelka. “It was a very challenging rescue.”

Police shut the westbound lanes of Canada’s busiest highway around 5 p.m. Friday after the young woman, who appeared to be in her teens, was spotted on the support beams of a Keele St. overpass.

Kaudelka said his partner, whom he identified only by his last name, Connell, raced up the underside of the bridge and grabbed the distraught woman’s arm.

Using a rope, Kaudelka secured himself and Connell to the bridge to prevent the woman from falling as cars and trucks sped by underneath.

“She would have been hanging over the westbound lanes if she slipped,” he said yesterday. “It felt like it took a long time but the entire thing took less than 10 minutes.”

He said three other officers managed to stop traffic on the westbound lanes during the daring rescue.

With the woman secured, a transport truck was summoned under the bridge and she was lowered to the roof of the trailer, police said.

The woman was then taken to Humber Church Hospital.

“We still don’t know who the woman is or how old she is,” Kaudelka said. “We know very little about her.”

Published in Cops, Heroes and Rescues
See also: torontosun.com