80 Year Old Canadian Man Rescues Stranded Motorists

An 80-year-old Canadian man’s good deed is getting praise after he rescued three cars of people trapped in a blizzard. Shannon St. Onge said she thought she could get home from work before the storm hit Pense, a town in Saskatchewan, Canada. She took a dirt road because she thought it would be better for the winter driving conditions but found herself driving with her head out the driver’s window as visibility worsened quickly.

She pulled over and called 911. The operator suggested she wait the storm out but the blizzard that was not projected to let up until dawn. The operators were inundated with calls that night and St.Onge said she started to panic when she called back and the call would not go through. A friend suggested she drop a pin on Google Maps, which she shared to a Pense community page on Facebook.

A stranger saw the post and recognized a farm near where Shannon was stuck. “He private messaged me and said, ‘I know that family. Send me your phone number and I’ll contact their son.” That’s when Andre Bouvier Sr., a farmer who lived about half a mile away from where she pulled over, got a call about St. Onge’s plea for help. He didn’t hesitate before throwing on his bright yellow jacket and snow boots.

His tractor would not start so he decided to head out on foot with a flashlight and walked through a blizzard. To his surprise, he found two other vehicles with people who also needed help stranded alongside St. Onge. He led all seven stranded people back to his home where his 70 year old wife greeted the strangers with a hot pot of coffee, homemade applesauce and a warm place to sleep for the evening.

St.Onge said “This family took seven of us stranded passengers off the road, fed us, laughed with us, bonded with us, gave us blankets, pillows and a warm place to rest our eyes for a few hours. When we all woke up at 5am, he had already plowed the driveway for us and at around 5:30, we made a little convoy and headed to town. Visibility was better, but still very, very poor. In the end, we all made it home safely and I have never hugged my kids tighter.”

Bouvier said the storm was the worst he’d ever seen; he could barely see in front of him, even with a flashlight but graciously said he didn’t want much credit for his efforts “Everybody would have done the same thing. You don’t think about it, you just do it” he said.