Semi Driver Spots Girl with Horse Out Truck Window After Icy Roads Leave Him Stranded Overnight
Canadian winters can be harsh. Motorists can easily find themselves stranded on roadways, because of heavy snow and icy conditions. That’s exactly what happened to semi-truck driver Peter Douglas.
The Winnipeg driver was captured by highway cameras after getting stuck on highway 10 south of Brandon. Looking at the footage, it’s easy to see why; conditions were fierce.
He was forced to sleep in his cab overnight, hoping the weather would clear up by the next morning. Instead, he woke up to find someone quite surprising knocking on his door.
Eighteen-year-old Eileen Eagle Bears was watching the traffic cams with her mother when they spotted the stranded truck driver just over 3 miles from their home. She told herself if he was still there when she looked again in the morning, she wanted to help.
The next morning, Douglas was still stuck, so the teen got her horse, Mr. Smudge, and headed Douglas’ direction. The trip would be roughly one hour in the cold.
“There was a lot of ice on the road from the rain that we had got and drifts were bad in a few places,” Eagle Bears told CBC News.
Imagine Douglas’ surprise when he awoke to see a young woman, her horse, and a thermos filled with hot coffee outside his window. A gesture those same highway cameras caught on video.
“She had to walk that horse half a mile up that hill and half a mile down because it was so icy. Blew me away,” said Douglas to CTV News. “She said she saw me on the camera. Her and her family were watching.”
Douglas was so grateful for her kind gesture, and she promised him that if he were still stuck there later in the day, she would return with a hot meal. “He was just really glad that someone knew that he was there and that someone cared,” said Eagle Bears.
She did, in fact, return later that evening with another thermos. This time it was filled with stew and potatoes. She also brought him water.
“I thought he would be getting pretty hungry, and that’s not a good feeling, I just put on extra clothes and did what I promised I would,” Eagle Bears stated. What an amazing young woman!
Douglas was stuck there for a total of 28 hours before finally being towed and able to get safely back on the road to finish his work. He still has Eagle Bears thermoses and plans to return them on his next run through the area.
Since hearing about her heroic story, Eagle Bears has been inundated with support and appreciation from strangers. “It is overwhelming. I had gotten back and my mom had posted just a post on Facebook,” she said.
“And there was a few likes at the beginning, but we went back and there was just more and more, and it just totally blew up,” said the teen. That’s not hard to understand, because hers was an act of kindness in the cold that is warming hearts across the world.
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