Governor Jay Nixon on Wednesday presented the state’s Medal of Valor to nine people, including three conservation agents who helped rescue motorists stranded by floodwaters in Northwest Missouri in September of 2014. Agents Eric Abbott, Jade Wright and Michael Maupin rescued a bus driver near Squaw Creek and helped numerous motorists trapped by flooding along I-29 near Mound City.
The following information is from the announcement from the governor’s office.
On Sept. 9, 2014, over nine inches of rain swept across northwest Missouri in a matter of hours, leading to widespread flash flooding, including along Squaw Creek in Holt County. A school bus with only the bus driver onboard was swept off Highway N, becoming lodged against a fence. With the swift water rising rapidly, a Department of Conservation boat was launched into a flooded ditch. Agent Wright maneuvered the boat through the roiling water with Agent Maupin and a Missouri State Highway Patrol sergeant also aboard. Together they were able to rescue the driver.
The flash flooding grew worse and shortly before midnight, in a matter of minutes, over three feet of water rushed across a one-half mile stretch of Interstate 29 near Mound City. Four vehicles were swept off the interstate, trapping seven motorists.
Agent Abbott had been first on the scene. He immediately shut down I-29. One of the four vehicles that were swept off the highway came to rest in the depressed highway median. The vehicle was entirely submerged, with only the luggage rack above the surface of the water. The driver was clinging for his life to the luggage rack. The rushing water was too turbulent to attempt a boat rescue. Agent Abbott grabbed rescue equipment and climbed onto the front of a MoDOT road grader, which was then driven into the swift water to the desperate motorist. Surrounded by swirling water, Agent Abbott threw the man a rescue rope and instructed him on how to secure it. On the count of three, the victim jumped toward the road grader into the roiling water. Agent Abbott braced himself on the grader and quickly pulled the victim to safety.
Agents Wright and Maupin improvised and used a MoDOT front end loader to reach a total of six trapped motorists, whose vehicles had been swept down an embankment. Riding in the front end loader’s bucket with life jackets and rescue equipment, they, along with a Highway Patrol sergeant, maneuvered through the swirling water and loaded the victims from their flooded vehicles into the bucket, and then safely back to land, in two separate trips.
Officials say this might be the first time agents from the Department of Conservation have received the Medal of Valor.
The Medal of Valor was first awarded in 2008 and is bestowed annually based on recommendations submitted by the Medal of Valor Review Board. Recipients must serve a public agency, with or without compensation, as a firefighter, law enforcement officer or emergency personnel. The nominating form states the Medal of Valor is awarded “to a public safety officer who has exhibited exceptional courage, extraordinary decisiveness and presence of mind, and unusual swiftness of action, regardless of his or her own personal safety, in the attempt to save or protect human life.”