ARVADA, Colo. — If practice makes perfect, then an Arvada man should be a certified hero any day now.
"It happens once and you think, 'Well, you know, we're bound to experience an accident at some point.' Happens twice and it's kind of like, 'OK.' A third time is kind of like, 'Well, is this a theme in my life now?'" Rob Reynolds said Monday.
He was driving near Kipling Street and W. 80th Avenue on Saturday evening when he saw a woman lose control of her car.
"I just noticed her on the right side of me. She sort of started drifting towards the curb and kind of hit the curb and bounced," he said.
The woman overcorrected, Reynolds said, and the car went over the curb and straight into the canal. Immediately, he called 911.
"I'm with the dispatcher and ran over, and I said, ‘Oh, my gosh, she's in the canal. She's upside down. We got to get … we got to get down there,'" he recalled.
With little hesitation, he and two other men jumped into the water to help rescue the woman.
An Arvada man is being called a hero for helping to rescue a woman trapped in a submerged car.
— Pattrik Perez (@PattrikPerez) July 12, 2021
Tonight at 6 on @DenverChannel, hear from the man in the bright shirt about why he had no hesitation when jumping into the water and why it's not his first time helping someone out. pic.twitter.com/Mv0lenZtHS
"Fortunately, kind of miraculously, I just sort of reached in the perfect, perfect position to pull her out," Reynolds said.
Police told him at the scene that if he and the other people who came to the woman's rescue had not witnessed the crash, the outcome could have been much different.
"You can't really see into the water. From the road, you can't see. So if people hadn't been there, myself included, it could have been … it could have been bad," Reynolds said.
This is not the first time Reynolds has stepped into action.
He's helped two other people in previous crashes he's witnessed. Perhaps it's thanks to his instincts as a former firefighter-in-training.
"Went to EMT school and then... I just sort of felt compelled to become a therapist," he said.
Now, he's helping people in other ways, mentally instead of physically, but he'll be ready when it's his turn again.
Arvada Police Department spokesperson Det. David Snelling said the woman, identified as 20-year-old Lindsay Jenson, was arrested on eight counts after the crash: first-degree aggravated motor vehicle theft; criminal possession of a financial device; possession of a defaced firearm; unlawfully carrying a concealed weapon; theft of license plates; driving under restraint; no proof of insurance; and careless driving.