Man forced to choose between saving wife or son

A DISTRAUGHT husband told how he had to abandon a bid to rescue his teenage son to save his wife from drowning in a murky river.

Stacy Horton saved his wife Vanessa, 35, as their son Silva, 13, drowned in the Whanganui River on New Zealand’s North Island after her car plunged into the river on Saturday night.

Mr Horton said hearrived at the crash scene less than two minutes after the accident to hear his wife screaming in the darkness and to see his son’s friend and the family dog scrambling up the bank.

Silva was trapped inside the submerged estate car.

He tried to dive down to the vehicle, which was nose down but with the tail lights burning more than 3ft below the surface, he told the Dominion Post newspaper.

“I tried to get down and get him but I couldn’t – it was just too deep. And Vanessa was going under,” Mr Horton said.

“I made a call to pull my wife to safety. I looked back and I could see the tail lights but it was too far and I couldn’t get him.

“Instead of going down and risking my life as well as my wife and son’s, I chose to take V(anessa) back and sat on the shore praying. It was all I could do.”

Police and firefighters were also unable to rescue the boy from inside the vehicle.

The car had skidded down a grassy bank and over a 10-metre cliff into a river near the family home in Wanganui on the west coast of the North Island.

Mid-Central police spokeswoman Kim Perks said of Mr Horton’s life-or-death decision: “I would certainly not have wanted to be in his shoes.”

Senior fire station officer Gary Wilson said the water was dark and firefighters struggled in vain to reach the car.

“We tried everything but to no avail,” he said.

Divers recovered Silva’s body on Sunday.