The heavy rain hammered down on Chattanooga, yet Troy Plemons pushed through the storm to perform an incredible act of heroism. At just 22, Plemons witnessed a vehicle rising in the floodwaters while he was on his way to fetch supplies for his job at EPB. As he drove along Interstate 24, he recognized the gravity of the situation unfolding before him. “I watched a vehicle starting to float,” he recounted, highlighting the urgency that compelled him into action.
Plemons joined forces with colleagues from Lawson Electric to confront the dangerous circumstances. Armed with sheer determination and a rock, Plemons smashed the window of a submerged SUV to rescue a panicked driver. “We could see the fear on her face,” Plemons recalled. The driver could not open her door, and Plemons witnessed the water rising relentlessly. “It just started sinking, and the water was rising as it was sinking,” he said, capturing the urgency of the moment. His decisive actions likely saved her life; as he pulled her from the vehicle, she was visibly distraught.
Anderson Stout, another eyewitness, described the situation from the floodline. “He swam 15 or 20 feet out there and grabbed a rock and broke her window,” Stout shared, recalling the intensity of Plemons’s rescue effort. The current was fierce, and vehicles around them were disappearing beneath the rushing waters. Stout noted a collective gasp among those present as they watched Plemons succeed in pulling the woman to safety. “I looked down and my knees were shaking. It was intense,” he admitted, illustrating the bravery displayed in such perilous conditions.
Plemons expressed a solemn sense of compassion, saying, “Everybody’s losing all their belongings… you know, there wasn’t anything you could really do, but just help them get out of the water.” While at least three lives were tragically lost during this storm, the narrative of Plemons’s courage stands out. His willingness to face danger for the sake of another highlights the power of the human spirit in times of crisis, showcasing what it means to be a true hero in the face of adversity.
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