Water rescue crews from Stanley and Challis were out till 1 a.m. April 16 trying to save a woman who drove into the Salmon River.

The effort lasted into the night partly because the victim couldn’t be convinced to get into the water.

“She was scared and I don’t blame her,” North Custer Rural Fire Chief Larry Garey said. Garey, along with firefighters from Challis and Stanley, EMS providers, Custer County Sheriff’s Office deputies and a St. Luke’s Medical Center helicopter crew, responded to the accident on Idaho Highway 75.

The woman lost control of her auto and went into the water, Garey said. Rescuers responded at about 8 p.m. on April 15 and were on the scene for about five hours. The auto “was in some rapids and it is spring time, so the water was kind of high,” Garey said. Sitting on the back end of her vehicle with the front stuck on a rock in the river, the woman was too afraid to move. Even when rescuers gave her a helmet, personal floatation device and a rope leading to shore, the fire chief said she wouldn’t budge.

So a water rescue crew had to get in rubber rafts and get the woman. Rescue personnel were worried that if a raft knocked into the auto too hard it could dislodge the vehicle which could have been moved down the river, Garey said. Despite the risk, the rescue crew got the woman on a raft and returned her to dry land, Garey said. Because the river is extremely cold, Garey said the driver developed hypothermia and had to be flown to a Boise hospital.

Another driver saw the woman stuck in the water and drove to an area with cell reception and called 911 to report the incident, Garey said.