A 4-year-old Oregon girl pulled her toddler sister from a car wreck that killed their mother and then huddled with her under a blanket in frigid temperatures until they were saved hours later by two passersby, police said.
Jessica Rath, 26, of Astoria, was driving with her two little girls to pick up her fisherman husband from a port late Tuesday night when she fell asleep at the wheel and barreled head-on into a tree, local police said.
Rath was killed instantly. Her daughters survived, but the 2-year-old, Lylah, was severely injured, according to local reports.
Police in Naselle, in southwest Washington, said Rath's 4-year-old, Arianna, pulled her sister from the wreck, grabbed a blanket, and then huddled with her in the woods for several hours, KAIT-TV reported.
Two men driving to work eventually found the girls at around 8 a.m., some six hours after the wreck, after noticing several scarred and broken trees.
Scott Beautler described seeing the little girls cowering together under the blanket, just a few feet from the crumpled car containing their dead mother.
"They were just staring at me," Beautler told KING-5 TV. "I said, 'babies are you okay?' And the oldest one started crying, and said, 'We're cold.'"
Both girls were taken to an Oregon hospital, where Arianna was treated and the released and Lylah was reportedly still being cared for on Thursday, according to local reports. Their father was with them.
Scott Beautler was headed to work with a friend on Wednesday morning when the two noticed several damaged trees on the side of the road. They pair went to investigate and found Rath dead in the car and the two little girls huddled together nearby.
Police said Rath had originally planned to pick up her husband at a port in Long Beach, Wash., when she left with the girls on Tuesday night.
During the drive, she spoke to her husband on the phone and he told her he was actually coming into Port of Portland, about two hours south of their Astoria home.
Authorities said the husband, who has not been identified, told Rath not to make the trip to Portland, but she said she'd pick him up.
Authorities believe the accident occurred at around 2 a.m., according to KING-5.
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