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Burke, NY Border Patrol Agent Rescues Children and Mother

Release Date
Tue, 02/21/2017

FORT COVINGTON, N.Y. – A U.S. Border Patrol agent assigned to the Burke Station rescued two children and their mother from hypothermia after their car overturned and partially submerged in a culvert on Sunday.

“Agent Tebo’s quick reaction saved two lives on Sunday,” said Acting Patrol Agent in Charge Glen Pickering. “He recognized the danger the pair were in and acted quickly to get both to safety.”

A Border Patrol agent rescues a mother and her children after a vehicle accident in northern New York.
A Border Patrol agent rescues a 
mother and her children after a  
vehicle accident in northern
New York.

On Sunday afternoon, while performing routine patrols, Agent Tebo observed an upside down car in a flooded ditch along Fountain Street.  The car had smashed through a guard rail, overturned, and slid down an embankment into a ditch.  The drainage ditch was partially frozen and melting snow from the area had flooded it.

Agent Tebo stopped and saw a young girl sitting in the snow and a woman in the water holding another child. The agent entered the water and retrieved the boy, age 3, and took him to his vehicle. The agent then reentered the partially frozen ditch and pulled the woman to safety.

Other agents and New York State Police Troopers arrived to assist. At the direction of an agent trained as an Emergency Medical Technician, they removed the boy’s clothing and wrapped him in their uniform shirts and coats. EMS arrived and took the boy and woman, his mother, to a local hospital. Soon after arrival, the boy was flown to the Vermont Medical Center where he is in pediatric intensive care.

The Swanton Sector is responsible for securing the land border between ports of entry in Vermont, New Hampshire and northeastern New York. The assistance of citizens is invaluable to their border security mission and they welcome community members to help them keep our nation’s borders safe and report suspicious activity at 1-800-689-3362.

For more on Customs and Border Protection’s mission at our nation’s ports of entry with CBP officers and along U.S. borders with Border Patrol agents, please visit the Border Security section of the CBP website.

Last Modified: Feb 03, 2021