Man, woman and baby survive freezing temps after car sinks in high water


An Air Evac helicopter takes off from Haskins Ford Thursday morning about four hours after a vehicle carrying Ava-area residents Richard Corn, Casey Dawn Shelton and her six-month-old baby Chaseton floated off the crossing in high water about 6 a.m. The victims escaped from the car and then waited, too cold to walk for help. Area resident Dan Donley saw them while checking cattle about 9:30 a.m. and summoned help. Pictured, from left, Tracy Meal, Theodosia Area VFD; Gainesville VFD chief Ed Doiron; Dr. Aaron Newton with Ozark County Search and Rescue, and TAVFD EMS director Allen Edgington. Times photo / Amelia LaMair

KY3 reporter Kadee Brosseau was at the Theodosia Area VFD firehouse Friday, interviewing the first responders who helped rescue Casey Shelton and her baby, Chaseton, and roommate, Richard Corn. Seated, from left: TAVFD Capt. Tracy Meal and TAVFD chief John Lubbers; Dr. Aaron Newton, Ozark County Search and Rescue; TAVFD EMS director Allen Edgington; and Brett and Jaime Meints, Thornfield VFD. Photo courtesy of Ed Doiron

Casey Dawn Shelton said Monday that her six-month-old baby, Chaseton, who’s been a patient in Mercy Hospital in Springfield since both were flown there from Haskins Ford by air ambulance Thursday morning, is making a strong recovery and is breathing on his own now after being on a ventilator. She said she’s waiting for him to smile or laugh – a sign that he’s back to his usual self. Photo courtesy Casey Dawn Shelton

Ava-area resident Casey Dawn Shelton says the Ozark County first responders who descended on Haskins Ford Thursday morning to rescue her and her baby, Chaseton, and her rooommate, Richard Corn, were “amazing and caring.” But she wants everyone to know that “God is the real hero. He made it all possible.”

About 6 a.m. Thursday, Shelton, 30, was a passenger in a Chrysler LeBaron driven by Corn as they traveled the backroads from a friend’s house in Thornfield, where they had spent the night, to Tammie Tinsley’s house on Highway 160 near Isabella. Six-month-old Chaseton was strapped into his carseat in the back seat of the sedan. A small dog was also riding with them in the car.

In the pre-dawn darkness, the Chrysler hit the high water covering Haskins Ford on County Road 863. They had driven into the Little North Fork River where it enters Bull Shoals Lake. Most of the time – at least in years past – the low-water crossing is dry. But since the Corps of Engineers raised the lake’s conservational pool and seasonal pool by 5 feet in 2013, the ford has been submerged more frequently, especially during times of heavy rain. 

Thursday morning, the water over Haskins Ford was estimated by one of the first responders to be 2 to 3 feet deep. Ozark County Western District Commissioner Greg Donley said Monday that road-closed signs had been set up on the road on both the north and south sides of the ford, but they are some distance away from the actual crossing. It’s not known if Corn and Shelton saw the signs – or if they saw them but thought the water had receded enough to make crossing the ford possible. 

However it happened, when the Chrysler entered the high water and began floating downstream, the engine died. In an online message to the Times Monday, Shelton said the car’s power windows stopped working when the car’s engine died.

“I tried breaking the window and couldn’t, and couldn’t get the door open,” she said in the message, which has been edited slightly for clarity. “So I said, ‘GOD OPEN THIS WINDOW!’ and then it rolled down. It let in the water, so I swam out and hurried and opened the back door. It was dark. I felt for Chaseton’s car seat straps and unbuckled him and pulled him out above the water.”

Then, clutching her baby, Shelton swam through the frigid water to the south bank of the river, a distance she estimated at 75 feet. 

“I really don’t know how I got across wearing cowgirl boots and a heavy coat,” she said. 

Shelton told KY3 reporter Kadee Brosseau Friday, “I almost tired out before I got to the bank. I prayed for God to give me the strength to get to the shore. I did. I couldn’t see the baby, but I knew he was struggling to breathe because he had went underwater more than once.” 

Corn also crawled out of the vehicle but remained on top of the sinking car awhile before swimming to the north bank of the stream.  

On the south bank, Shelton and her baby huddled in their wet clothes in the 30-degree temperatures, too cold to move. When it seemed that Chaseton was struggling to breathe, Shelton gave him mouth-to-mouth resuscitation. “I had to,” she said. “He tried to die on me. Me getting the water outta his lungs saved his life. God was there. He was guiding me.”

Hours passed, with no one traveling the closed section of county road; the bedraggled survivors grew colder and colder. Finally, around 9:30 a.m. Thornfield resident Dan Donley happened to be on the north side of the river, checking on his cattle, when he spotted Corn at the water’s edge. Donley rushed to help and also called Thornfield Volunteer Fire Department first responder Brett Meints and his wife, Jaime, a nurse, who live nearby. They arrived quickly, Brett Meints told the Times, probably around 9:45. The sheriff’s office log shows that the first call about the situation came in at 9:48 a.m. Theodosia Area VFD first responders were dispatched to attend to Shelton and her baby, who remained on the south side of the river, disabled by hypothermia and unable to move.

Corn, also suffering from hypothermia, was so cold he had to be lifted into Donley’s truck to await the Cox ambulance, responding from Ava, Meints said.

Ozark County Sheriff’s deputies, Ozark County Ambulance and Missouri State Highway Patrol Water Division trooper John Roberts responded to the south side of the river; three air-ambulance helicopters had arrived by about 11:15 a.m., according to the sheriff’s dispatcher log. Roberts said by the time rescuers arrived, the vehicle was completely submerged in the stream.

Meints said all three victims were suffering from severe hypothermia. Sheriff’s Deputy Cpl. Curtis Dobbs said rescuers weren’t sure at first that the baby was alive because he was barely breathing. 

When Brosseau, the KY3 reporter, interviewed the rescuers Friday, Allen Edgington, TAVFD’s EMS director, said, “I thought, ‘Oh my god, she’s holding a dead baby.’ Of course, that takes you back a little bit.”  

Edgington told Brosseau he took the baby to sheriff’s deputies, who did their best to warm up the infant while Edgington stayed with Shelton until the Ozark County Ambulance arrived on the south side of the river. 

Chaseton was transported to Mercy Hospital in Springfield in a four-blade helicopter ambulance, which is faster than the other two helicopters with two blades, the Times was told. Shelton was also taken to Mercy Hospital by helicopter.

On the north side of the river, Jaime Meints had stepped into the river’s edge to rescue the dog that was stranded on a large rock in the flowing stream, Brett Meints said. 

When the dog was brought to Corn, he “latched onto it,” Meints said. It was decided that Corn would be transported by the ground-based ambulance out of Ava, rather than the third helicopter that responded to the scene. The dog rode with Corn in the ambulance. “The guy held onto him when they loaded him,” Meintz said. 

In the hospital, Shelton and Corn were treated and released, but Chaseton was put on a ventilator to help him breathe. In online messages Monday from the hospital, Shelton said Chaseton is off the ventilator now, but she expects he’ll remain hospitalized awhile longer.

“He is almost back to himself,” she said. “I am waiting for a smile or laugh. That tells me he’s himself.”

She said the doctor had told her, after Chaseton underwent an MRI, that he appeared to have no brain damage from the ordeal. 

Talking with the Times about the Thursday evening, MSHP’s John Roberts urged residents to be mindful of water covering any county roadways, invoking the familiar adage, “Turn around, don’t drown.”

He added, “We’re very lucky that no lives were lost this time.”

Shelton agrees but says the happy ending was more than luck. “My story is important ... because it is a story that can change lives,” she told the Times. “It all has to do with God being real.”

Ozark County Times

504 Third Steet
PO Box 188
Gainesville, MO 65655

Phone: (417) 679-4641
Fax: (417) 679-3423