A driver in Port Aransas, Texas, had a wildly lucky escape on the morning of July 1 after their truck plunged into the water near the ship channel. This was then followed by a lengthy recovery operation that lasted well into the afternoon.
According to the Port Aransas South Jetty, the driver was able to escape the vehicle and climb onto the nearby jetty after the truck entered the water. Fortunately, it was also reported that he didn’t really suffer any injuries.
Of course, surviving all of that was only the beginning of this guy’s problems. Once the truck was in the water, response teams jumped into action to help.
Soon, the place was filled with members of the Port Aransas Police Department, the U.S. Coast Guard, the Port of Corpus Christi, the Corpus Christi Police Department, and the Port Aransas dive team.
Divers Spent Nearly Six Hours Searching for the Missing Truck
The Corpus Christi dive crews got the call about the incident at 8 am on Wednesday morning. By 10 am, most everyone else had arrived, and divers were able to get in the water by 11 am.
Interestingly, actually finding the vehicle proved to be a lot harder than expected. The truck had apparently moved significantly from where it had originally fallen into the water.
Before finding the truck itself, divers discovered scattered power tools and other belongings that had apparently spilled from the vehicle.
After roughly five to six hours of searching, divers finally located the truck at around 4 pm.
The Driver Escaped, but the Truck Wasn’t So Lucky
At one point, there were a total of ten people helping out. According to the officers on the scene, the truck got into the water in the first place because the man driving it was doing donuts on the beach.
When police located the driver, they arrested him on a warrant. Both the driver’s name and what the warrant was for were made clear.
But what was made known is that James Stokes, the chief of the Port Aransas Police Department, said that the driver was a 31-year-old San Antonio resident.
The Internet Immediately Got To Work Making Jokes
Commenters were surprised that something like this could happen, with one person writing, “It’s amazing how much sand had built up over the years. I was reading the post, trying to figure out he drove over the jetty because the last time I was there was in the late 70s, and you had to crawl up onto the jetty.”
Other comments were from the Port Aransas South Jetty itself, as it informed people of what was happening live. The most recent comment from it reads, “The Coast Guard has issued a marine safety bulletin, informing mariners that they must avoid the area while salvage operations take place.”
Personally, my favorite comment is, “Dude drives his Chevy over the levee, and the levee was not dry.” As with all criminal cases, the suspects are considered innocent unless proven guilty in a court of law.