Emily Brown
Dramatic footage filmed live by a TV weather crew shows the moment a journalist rescued a woman amid deadly flash floods in Texas.
Journalist Robert Ray was preparing to report on the floods in Dallas on Monday morning (22 August) when he saw the woman drive on to a road covered in water.
Her car was quickly submerged as a result of the torrential rain which had lashed down in the Dallas-Fort Worth Metroplex, leading to flash flooding.
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See the moment he rescued the driver below:
Ray told Fox the driver pulled onto the water-covered road while he was setting up for his shot, saying: "The next thing you know, her car was floating."
Footage from the incident shows the front end of the vehicle completely submerged under the water, sunken headlights lighting up the water around them. Ray pushed the car through the water to try and get it to higher ground, but when that plan proved useless he helped the woman climb out of her window to safety.
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The woman, Stephanie Carroll, later assured: "I'm OK. I'm OK by the grace of God."
Carroll explained she hadn't seen the water on the road when she approached the intersection, but when she hit the flooded area she thought she might not make it.
"I didn't see anything," Carroll said. "I thought I was just going to drive. I go this way every day to get my daughter. I thought I was dying. I thought I was going to die. I thought I was going to drown."
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Carroll described Ray as 'awesome' and a 'blessing from God', and urged other drivers to 'be watchful' when driving after heavy rains.
Dallas alone had received nearly 15 inches of rain the night before the incident, and when Ray arrived in the area the following morning he spoke with city workers who said they would bring pumps in to try and get rid of some of the water.
He explained: "Gosh, guys, over 8 inches of rain has fallen in some spots in about a 12-hour period. People are in harm's way. This is a prime example, guys, of what water and flash flooding can do. My goodness. My heart is 'boom, boom, boom' right now. What a morning here in Dallas."
Between 10:00pm local time on Sunday and around midday on Monday, the Fort Worth Fire Department responded to as many as 40 high water investigations.
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