Katherine Bauer was trapped in a car with Hurricane Ida's floodwaters rushing in when her husband Dan in the driver's seat shoved her through the cracked rear windshield, shouting 'go, go, go!'
'I thought he was right behind me,' Katherine cried during an exclusive interview Friday with DailyMail.com, recalling the tragic night for the first time from her hospital bed in the far northern suburbs of Philadelphia.
The couple were attending their daughter Sophie's college volleyball game in Center Valley early Wednesday evening when the rain began to pick up.
Sophie's team lost the game, but her father Dan gave her a pep talk afterward.
'It was a rough game for us, but he told me to keep my head up and to keep playing,' Sophie told DailyMail.com. 'He said he loved me and I hugged him and my mom goodbye.'
Katherine Bauer was trapped in a car with Hurricane Ida's floodwaters rushing in when her husband Dan in the driver's seat shoved her through the cracked rear windshield, shouting 'go, go, go!'
The couple were attending their daughter Sophie's (pictured with her father Dan) college volleyball game in Center Valley early Wednesday evening when the rain began to pick up
Katherine, 54 and her 65-year-old husband (pictured on their wedding day) hopped into their Mazda SUV and started to head home after the game, but the floodwaters were rising so they had to take several detours down routes they'd never driven before
Katherine, 54 and her 65-year-old husband hopped into their Mazda SUV and started to head home, but the floodwaters were rising so they had to take several detours down routes they'd never driven before.
They stopped at a hardware store to try to buy a sump pump for Katherine's mother, whose house was at risk of flooding. Then they continued on their drive home to unincorporated Perkiomenville, Pennsylvania, taking a turn down Trumbauersville Road.
As they approached a creek, a wall of water came rushing across the roadway.
'All of a sudden a tidal wave of water came over the windshield and, within seconds, our engine died,' Katherine said. 'We struck a house, which broke out our rear window. It was dark and we were floating, gaining water.'
Vehicles are under water during flooding in Philadelphia, Thursday, in the aftermath of downpours and high winds from the remnants of Hurricane Ida that hit the area
Kayakers paddel down a portion of Interstate 676 after flooding from heavy rains from hurricane Ida in Philadelphia. Flash flooding caused by the remnants of Hurricane Ida killed at least 44 people in four northeastern US states overnight into Thursday, including several who perished in basements during the 'historic' weather event officials blamed on climate change
Vehicles are under floodwater from Schuylkill River in the Manayunk section of Philadelphia, Thursday. Dan Bauer was one of several who didn't make it out of their vehicles alive
Katherine was on her cell phone speaking with her 23-year-old son, Darby, when they came to a stop. After striking the house, she called 911.
She and her husband were shouting into the phone.
'The 911 operator's like, 'Stop shouting, where are you?' she recalled.
'And I'm like, 'We don't know where we are.'
The water continued to rise.
'We were like, we have to get out now,' she said.
They unfastened their seatbelts. She climbed over the console into the back seat, as her husband shouted at her to jump out.
'He pushed me out,' she said.
Suddenly, she found herself floating downstream. 'I grabbed the nearest branch and held on,' she said.
'I kept yelling for help, hoping someone would hear me,' she said. 'Then the branch started to break.'
'I put myself in God's hands and let go,' she said.
She floated to another tree just downstream.
'I grabbed on and was just praying,' she said. 'The water was rising, and I climbed higher on the tree branch.'
Then she saw a light in the distance and heard someone yell.
'I'm here!' she shouted back, though the stranger couldn't reach
