FAIRFIELD, Ill. (AP) — An Illinois state trooper is being honored with the agency’s Medal of Honor for rescuing a McLeansboro man from a car that had plunged into a flooded drainage ditch last year.

The rescue happened last August. Trooper Jason Blessing of Fairfield spotted a car that had driven off the roadway into the ditch near Illinois 14 in Hamilton County.

Blessing swam to the submerged vehicle to rescue 54-year-old Allen L. Klein. A passerby also jumped in the water with a hammer and the two broke a window of the car. When the passerby had trouble swimming, Blessing and another person pulled him to safety before Blessing returned to the water to rescue the motionless Klein. He and others revived Klein.

 

 

 

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