Strangers save Hancock Co. woman from fiery wreck

HANCOCK COUNTY, Ind. (WISH) — A young woman believes she is lucky to be alive, after a fiery wreck in rural Hancock County earlier this summer.

Paige Stroup said she was driving 50-55 miles per hour on 300 West, a small gravel road, when she lost control and crashed. Stroup doesn’t remember much of the crash, but firefighters said she likely rolled her car before it stopped on the side of the road.

Colton Delhagen and his girlfriend, Morgan, usually don’t drive on 300 West. Neither does retired EMT, Mike Grant. On that July afternoon, both Delhagen and Grant took different routes home.

“For some reason I said I’m going to run up and go up 300,” said Grant.

When Grant and Delhagen each turned on to the road, they saw Stroup’s SUV.

“When we pulled up, there was fire coming out of the hood of the vehicle,” said Grant.

“We could feel the heat 30-40 feet away from it,” said Delhagen.

The two men, who had never met, knew exactly what to do — and pulled Stroup out of the burning vehicle.

“As soon as we got her out it started catching fire inside of the vehicle,” said Delhagen.

It only took a few minutes for firefighters and medics to get there, but those few minutes made all the difference.

“If we wouldn’t have rolled up, if we wouldn’t have came by when we did, she wouldn’t be here. She would have died during the fire. She would have burnt up completely,” said Delhagen.

Thanks to the actions of strangers, Stroup made it out alive. She told 24-Hour News 8 she had a severe concussion that kept her in the hospital for a few days. Doctors watched for internal bleeding and tended to her minor cuts, burns and bruises. While she was in the hospital, her family told her about the strangers she owes her life. Stroup said she’s thankful she can’t remember the wreck.

“I still just couldn’t believe it was real,” said Stroup, looking at the photos of her smoldering SUV.

Delhagen and his girlfriend came to visit Stroup in the hospital. Stroup said she introduced them to the nurses as her “angels.”

“If they weren’t there, when they were…if they were there 2 minutes later, I could have been way worse,” said Stroup.

Looking back, Delhagen and Grant shrug off their new titles.

“I’m not really a hero. Just doing a good deed I guess,” said Delhagen.

“I mean, you just do what you gotta do,” said Grant.

Stroup sees their actions differently.

“There’s no words to ever describe it. There’s no way to ever repay them, there’s no way to ever thank them enough,” said Stroup.

That doesn’t stop her from trying. Three weeks after her crash, Stroup reunited with her heroes. The Sugar Creek Fire Department presented them with an award for their bravery.

Family members thanked the heroes for saving Stroup’s life and marveled at the odds they would end up on that road.

“I can’t even wrap my head around the fact that they came down that road,” said Stroup.

Some might call it fate and others could say it was chance, but the people who lived it said it was something more.

“It just tells me that God was looking out for her that day,” said Grant.

“My mom [was there]. She passed away from breast cancer a couple years ago…but there’s no way she wasn’t there with me. Normally, I don’t believe in stuff like that. I do believe in God, but on my own terms. She [my mom] must have been there. She was there saving me. She was holding the flames back from getting me,” said Stroup, “There’s no way that there wasn’t something going on. I’m so thankful there’s no words. I could say thank you 100 times, every second, every day for the rest of my life and it would still not be enough.”