Teen Thrown from Bridge Shares Remarkable Survival Story: How Calm, Courage, and a Grandmother’s Lesson Saved Her Life

Memorial Day weekend is supposed to be a time for family, for memories, for laughter on the water’s edge. For Kirsten Fenwick, it became the day she learned the true meaning of survival—and the power of a lesson passed down through generations.

The Crash That Changed Everything

It started as a perfect afternoon: Kirsten, her dad, and her younger brother and sister were fishing off the Hanover Street Bridge in Baltimore. The sun was warm, the river below calm. Then, in an instant, everything changed.

“I saw this Chevy Trailblazer swerving all over the road, coming straight for us,” Kirsten recalls, her voice steady but her eyes haunted by the memory. “It slammed into the back of my dad’s car. I was smashed between the vehicles—then suddenly, I was falling.”

She doesn’t remember hitting the water. One moment she was standing on the bridge, the next, she was deep below the surface of the Patapsco River, battered and disoriented.

Panic—and the Power of a Grandmother’s Lesson

“It was like something out of a scary movie,” Kirsten says. “I couldn’t feel my legs. I panicked, and when I panicked, I started to sink.”

But then, in that moment of terror, she remembered her grandmother’s voice from years ago: “If you ever fall in, don’t fight the water. Stay calm. Float.”

Kirsten forced herself to stop struggling. She lay back, stretched out her arms, and let the river hold her up. “I just kept telling myself, ‘Don’t panic. Float. Just float.’”

A Rescue Turns Desperate

Her father, seeing his daughter vanish into the river, jumped in without hesitation. But the current was strong, and panic overtook him. Instead of pulling Kirsten to safety, they both began to sink. Kirsten could see the fear in her father’s eyes. Desperate, she shouted, “Float! Dad, just float!”

“I couldn’t teach him physically, but he watched what I was doing,” she remembers. “He tried to copy me. But the waves kept pushing me farther away. The water was over my ears—I could barely hear—but then I heard him scream. My heart stopped, then I realized he was still alive.”

In the chaos, Kirsten heard her father shout to rescuers, “Get her, not me!” She wanted to scream back, “No, get him! He’s panicking!” But the river had carried her too far.

Miraculous Survival, Lifelong Scars

Eventually, help arrived. Kirsten was pulled from the water—battered, bruised, and with a broken pelvis that would require five surgeries. She would spend weeks in the hospital, her body healing even as her spirit struggled to process the trauma.

Police later revealed that the Chevy’s driver—a Maryland resident with Virginia tags—had no insurance, and the SUV had a broken axle. Despite the devastation, the driver was not arrested, only cited. “It’s not enough,” Kirsten’s family says. “The damage to Kirsten will last a lifetime.”

To make matters worse, as rescuers worked to save her, someone stole items from her father’s truck—fishing gear, a cooler, even her sister’s backpack.

Finding Hope, Sharing Her Story

Yet through it all, Kirsten has found a sense of purpose. She’s writing a book about her ordeal, determined to turn her pain into a message of hope. “I just sat there in the water, asking God to keep me alive. I kept floating, just like Grandma taught me. Eventually, someone grabbed me.”

She’s also set up a GoFundMe to help with her mounting medical bills, and she’s grateful that she, not her little sister, was the one to fall. “I’m glad it was me. I’m stronger. I can handle it.”

The Lesson That Saved Her Life

Kirsten’s survival wasn’t just luck. It was the result of a simple lesson, lovingly taught and fiercely remembered under the most impossible circumstances. “Don’t panic. Float.” Those words saved her life—and her father’s, too.

Now, as she faces more surgeries and a long road to recovery, Kirsten’s message is clear: “You never know when you’ll need to be strong. But if you stay calm, you can survive anything.”

If you want to support Kirsten’s recovery, you can find her GoFundMe link on the WBAL-TV app.

Reporting live from the Hanover Street Bridge, this is a story of courage, faith, and the quiet power of a grandmother’s wisdom.