The Woman in Pink Who Leapt into Humboldt Bay to Save a Man Gets Carnegie Hero Award

Hiedi Johnston holding up her medal in this screenshot from the Board of Supervisors online meeting this week.

In September, a Willow Creek woman received the prestigious Carnegie Hero Medal for her actions on January 2 of this year when an older man, apparently suffering a medical emergency, drove his truck into Humboldt Bay and a trio of rescuers including Hiedi Johnston brought him safe to shore.

This week, the Humboldt County Board of Supervisors also recognized her for her heroic actions.

But last January, when Hiedi, a stay at home mom, and her family were sitting in their truck watching the Bay waiting for a pharmacy to open after lunch she didn’t have a clue that she would soon be hailed as a hero after community members identified her as the woman in pink who leapt into the Bay to save a stranger.

Hiedi’s family was just chatting that day when a pickup launched into the Humboldt Bay not far from them.

Hiedi told us when we spoke to her after she helped save the driver, ““We weren’t there for five minutes…I heard this engine wind up….It was like the Dukes of Hazard. A truck just launched up in the air…It really launched! It was a ways out. It just kind of drifted and floated [in the Bay].”

Vehicle in the Bay. [Photo provided by Amber Rose McCovey-Billings]

“I walked as far as I could at a fast pace,” she told us. “Then I just started to swim….When I first got out there, the truck was still floating but the water was coming up.”

She said she asked herself, “How am I going to get in the pickup? [The driver] was just looking straight out the front window. He wasn’t reacting… I thought maybe I could get the door open…I tried but it didn’t work.”

The man continued not to respond and the door wouldn’t open. Then, Hiedi said she doesn’t understand how it happened, but the driver’s side window where she was just rolled down. She said the driver had turned his head a little as if to look at her. “He smiled a well-aren’t-we-in-a-pickle smile,” she explained. “And at that moment, it was like he rolled down the window, but I don’t know how he could, because his arms weren’t working.”

With the window now down, Hiedi said she worried how she would get the man out through the window while swimming. “I didn’t know if I was a good enough swimmer to get him through the window and back to shore,” she explained. She said she thought, “Maybe it is safer to wait. Someone will come… .”

She described the driver as sitting there quietly through everything–“totally calm…so relaxed.” She asked herself how she was going to be able “to pull someone out of a sitting position through a window while treading water. What are the chances of that?”

Then she said, “All of the sudden, the water made a gurgling sound. The water just rushed [into the pickup].”

Hiedi said she told herself, “I can’t wait anymore. I’ve got to get him out now…He wasn’t trying to unbuckle…So I just pushed myself up on the door and reached across him and was able to unhook the belt.”

At that point, Hiedi said, “The water just made this whoomp sound. I pulled with everything I had. He twisted…I don’t know if the water helped. But he came out of the window…I don’t think he was meant to die that day. God must have plans for him.”

She now was holding the man up in the water. “It was kind of little bit eerie,” she explained. “The water sucked down. It felt like it was pulling me down. It didn’t do anything, but I could feel the currents sucking down on the truck.”

She grabbed onto the small antenna on the top of the truck. “I put my foot on the cab but they slid….My shoes were slick.” But she was able to wedge her foot where the windshield met the cab and was able to hold the driver up. Then, another man swam up to assist.

At this point, Patty Mayo (AKA Patrick Thomas) a YouTube Celebrity arrived in a decommissioned Coast Guard craft. (Read his story here.) “He was really good and maneuvered it over the top of the cab of the pickup,” Hiedi explained.

She and an unknown gentleman helped get the driver into the boat. “The older gentleman was very kind and helpful,” she explained. “He was strong and really pushing.” she said. “[Both of the men] really lifted to get the guy out of the water.”

Mayo took the boat to shore and medical personnel took charge of the driver. “The older gentleman in the pickup looked bruised and really sore and bloody,” Hiedi said. “I saw the elderly gentleman later [before the ambulance carried him to the hospital]. I think I said, ‘Take care of yourself, mister.’ He kinda smiled like he was saying thank you.”

To this day, Hiedi doesn’t really think she did anything really heroic compared to other winners of the Carnegie Hero Medal. “After reading about them to be honest, I don’t know if I did enough…I just swam in the Bay and got stinky,” she laughed when she spoke to us recently. She added, “I’m a little emotional about it, because there were people who gave so much…I’m just honored to be named with those people.”

Recently, Hiedi learned that the man she saved passed about six months after she helped rescue him. “My heart just sank and I felt horrible,” she said. “I cried and cried.” But still she thought there was a reason the man was saved even if it was just for a short time.

Eventually she told us that she came to an understanding that “the goodness that came out of” the rescue is making the world a better place. “Sometimes it is so easy to overlook the good things cause the bad stuff smacks us upside the head like a two by four,” she explained. She told us that she thinks that people learned from the rescue that it’s possible for ordinary people to do good things. And they don’t have to be big things.

“We can all do something good,” she said. “I think about Andrew Carnegie at the end of his life he needed to give back and leave the world a better place. He had millions of dollars to make things better. Well, we don’t have that. But we have millions of millions of love. We can take that love in our heart and we can do something for our neighbors.”

She noted that we don’t tend to notice the good people do. “We forget how many people are already doing things for others–mowing lawns for the elderly, bringing dinners to sick people, stores donating school uniforms… .”

She vowed she would be doing more small, good acts herself. “I want to leave the world a better place,” she explained. “I don’t have millions to do it, but I do have love.”

Earlier:

• Vehicle Submerged in Humboldt Bay; Several People in the Water
• YouTube Celebrity Bounty Hunter, a Woman Wearing Pink, and an Older Gentleman Helped Rescue Man Who Drove Into Humboldt Bay
• ‘We didn’t have fear; we just went and did’: Woman in Pink Describes How She Saved an Elderly Man Who Drove Into the Humboldt Bay
• The Woman in Pink and a YouTube Star Receive Recognition for Their Lifesaving Heroics