HispanicBusiness

The crash happened so fast, Linda Gravis didn't have time to think she might die.

After her Honda flew off a cliff in the Soquel Hills in California last week, landing precariously in a tree 30 feet above a creek, she said she was terrified. She screamed for help as she surveyed the landscape. She and her husband Duard were trapped in the car, suspended from the tree, the car at a 60 degree angle.

"There was a creek below, way down there," Linda Gravis, 59, said Thursday. "I thought, thank God we didn't get down there."

Had anyone seen the crash? Could anyone rescue her and her husband, whose momentary lapse of inattention left them teetering on the brink of death?

Thursday, Linda described the harrowing crash and thanked emergency responders for bravely scaling the cliff to save them.

Duard Gravis, 69, was driving the Honda Accord with his wife in the passenger seat having left their daughter's home in Soquel en route to their home on Hoover Road about 2:30 p.m. Jan. 18.

They were cruising on a familiar stretch of Soquel-San Jose Road about a half-mile from home when they maneuvered a sharp curve.

"My husband was driving and I wasn't watching. I was thinking of things I had to do," said Linda, a retired receptionist for Santa Clara County where her husband also had worked.

While taking the curve, some birds caught Duard's eye.

"The next thing I saw was the car veering," she said.

They launched off the road and down the 80-foot cliff going about 40 mph.

Branches flashed by as they hurtled downward.

"We went through a few trees and we could see branches and trees," Linda said. "We were bouncing, hitting trees. I guess the car rolled and flipped over. That's when we landed on a tree that really caught us."

The Honda stopped, suspended sideways.

The passenger side of the car was down, the hood of the car tilted up, Linda said.

They were in shock.

The couple was wearing their seat belts and suffered only minor injuries. Linda suffered a gash on her left hand. Duard's sternum hurt, but he was otherwise fine, physically.

Yet the car was not stable. The more than 2,500-pound hulk of metal could topple down to the creek below at any moment, according to firefighters.

Linda Gravis considered her own death if they made sudden movements. The tree that saved them also trapped them inside the car.

"We had no way of knowing if anyone was there. It was in the middle of the afternoon and it's not really a busy road. I pushed open the window and yelled" for help, she said.

Linda heard a woman's voice from a house below, but couldn't see her.

The woman yelled that the car was balanced in the tree.

"Don't move! Hang tight," the woman screamed.

The woman, who lived down the cliff, called 911, as did someone on the road, according to the California Highway Patrol.

Central firefighters, the CHP and Cal Fire responded, closing Soquel-San Jose Road for three hours during the rescue, said Central Fire spokesman Mike DeMars.

Central firefighters Tony Donato and Shane Williams rappelled to the totaled Honda. They told the couple to stay still so the car wouldn't shift.

"I thought, how do we get out of here? They had to cut the windshield to get us out. That was really the only way to get us out," Linda said.

Through a side window opening, the firefighters handed them a blanket for protection in the front seats before they removed the windshield. Rescuers took Duard up first with a harness and Linda second.

The couple was taken to Dominican Hospital where they were treated and released.

"I can't say enough for everyone involved. The two rescue workers from Central Fire -- Tony and Shane -- they were just the best. They really encouraged me and reassured me," Linda said.

Both suffered some chest pain and are bruised. Linda tore a tendon in her thumb and wears a splint. But they have their lives.

Linda Gravis said they are grateful to everyone involved in the rescue including CHP officers Chris Inagawa and Sam Courtney.

"We were very blessed," Linda said. She hoped the crash would serve as a warning to other drivers to avoid distractions.

"It doesn't take much for something to go wrong. You don't even have to be on a cellphone."