Sheridan Woman Who Drove Car Into River Says She Passed Out

Barbara Wegener was two days into a head cold and adjusting to a change in her medication when she turned to pull out of a parking lot on Coffeen Avenue in Sheridan late Wednesday morning.

Everything went black, and she woke to the feel of her car’s airbag slamming her body and cold water rushing into her little red passenger car, Wegener told Cowboy State Daily in a Thursday interview.

She fumbled to unbuckle her seat belt and jumped into the back seat. Meanwhile, people who saw her car drive off the road and into Little Goose Creek were trying to get into her car. She had to lean back into the front driver’s side area to unlock the doors so they could get to her, she said.

The Sheridan Police Department, Sheridan Fire Rescue and emergency medical personnel responded at about 11:09 a.m. Responders pulled Wegener out of the car and took her to the Sheridan Memorial Hospital.

Surgery Possible

Audibly pained, Wegener, 52, gave her phone interview from the hospital Thursday. She expects to remain there for the next two to three days.

Her head, chest, stomach, foot, left arm and legs ache. Hospital staffers are planning to do an X-ray on her ailing middle back to see if a vertebra is broken.

If it is, she may need surgery and can expect to be bedridden for the next two to four months, she said.

“They still don’t know why I passed out,” said Wegener.

In describing her recent medication change, she said her local doctor had taken her off a couple of medications and had her increase others.

“You know as much as I do,” she said with a strained chuckle.

Wegener’s oldest daughter Jenny Leach said the parking lot in question was between the O’Reilly’s auto parts store and Plains Tire. The car wasn’t launched off the bridge, but plunged down an embankment, she said. 

And Leach had a message for the many public commenters who have weighed in on this incident.

“It wasn’t a suicide attempt,” said Leach. Her mother “has had multiple health problems over the years, and I recently had to move her back in with me because things were just getting a little too rough for her to handle on her own, financially and stuff.”

Leach said she and her little sister will be taking care of their mother during her recovery.

After You Left

Once Wegener was taken to the hospital, a recovery crew cabled the car to a crane truck parked on the bridge about 20 feet above it and hoisted it from the river and onto the bridge.

Wegener is not charged with any crimes, says a Thursday statement by the Sheridan Police Department.

Steve Schreffler, interactive media manager for Sheridan Media, happened to be wearing waterproof boots when someone sent him a tip about heavy police presence along the bridge. It was about 11:30 a.m. and he was on his lunch break, but he figured he’d go check it out.

Police on scene weren’t giving out much information, and Wegener was no longer there. So Schreffler waded into the river and started taking video.

He decided to push the video to a live audience to do his part to keep traffic flowing.

“There were a lot of people showing up on scene, just to kind of check it out,” he said. “And we went live to hopefully help people (with) like, not showing up and maybe impacting (authorities’) efforts.”

The result was a picturesque, 23-minute-long video of the creek shimmering under the methodical crank-and-cable efforts on the bridge.

Coffeen Avenue is one of the busiest thoroughfares in Sheridan, Schreffler said.

He kept filming until the car was back on the bridge — behind a crumbling autumn elm and a scraggly Russian olive tree that hemmed the creek — then he thanked his viewers and gave a “hats off” commendation to Sheridan’s emergency responders.

Clair McFarland can be reached at clair@cowboystatedaily.com.