Emergency workers reunite with man they rescued after 75-foot plunge from bridge

ROWAN COUNTY, N.C. — Emergency workers reunited Thursday with the man they rescued after he fell 75 feet from a bridge in Rowan County.

"I was expecting for him to have some serious injuries,” said Salisbury Firefighter Kinston Nesbitt.

The last time Nesbitt saw 24-year-old Jeremiah Cribb, he was curled up 75 feet below the Yadkin River Bridge. Cribb and a co-worker had tried to help a stranded driver on Interstate 85, but a speeding semi-truck forced him to jump off the bridge.

[ PREVIOUS COVERAGE: 'Grace of God’: FedEx driver shares survival story after 75-foot fall from I-85 bridge ]

“Honestly when we pulled up, the state trooper was holding the flashlight over the bridge and his co-worker was there and the lady he stopped to help was there and we both said this guy is gonna be dead, but he wasn’t,” said Nesbitt.

On that cold, wet and dark morning, two firefighters rappelled down the bridge to rescue Cribb. It was an exercise they had only practiced before on a tower at the fire station. That practice tower is only about 45 feet high.

“Training you can mess up. When you’re out there doing it, you better know what you’re doing,” said firefighter Jacob Vodochosky.

They made it to the ground safely, and paramedics on the bridge talked to Cribb on his cellphone below.

Amazingly, he had no major injuries and they were able to rappel him up to the top of the bridge.

“As soon as his feet hit the ground he was like, ‘Do I have to go to the hospital?’” said Ashley Melchor, a sub paramedic with Rowan EMS. “I was like, ‘You’re getting on this stretcher. We’ll talk about it in the ambulance.’”

“He stopped to help people, and that’s what we do. In many ways I think our guys feel like they were rescuing one of their own,” said Fire Marshal Terry Smith.

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