GOLDEN, Colo. — It started like any other Friday at work.
Travis Cordova arrived for his shift at the Coors Brewery in Golden Friday afternoon. But when he pulled into the parking lot, he heard a commotion.
“I saw a group of bystanders standing on this bridge, on their phones, pointing at a girl in a raft,” he recalled. “I had just caught the tail end of her, just as she was going underneath this bridge."
“She” was a female tuber in Clear Creek, which runs through the brewery's property. And she was clearly in distress.
“If you see people rafting in this part of the river, it's bad news,” Cordova said. “You shouldn’t be in this part of the river.”
Cordova said he jumped back into his vehicle and drove downstream. His first attempt to reach the woman in the water was unsuccessful. He went further down the waterway for a second attempt.
“I first jumped in there and my boy Nash was back there, had my back, he was holding onto me,” Cordova said, referencing fellow Coors employee, Sean Nash. “When I grabbed her, it was so cold, and I was so cold. I landed her on the beach and I was completely out of it. My body was done. Luckily those guys were there to help her, because I was frozen basically at this point.”
Cordova, a Bottle Specialist, and Nash, a Senior Specialist in Brewing, were assisted by three other employees: Jacqueline Harmon, Senior Specialist in Fermenting; Louis Gomez, Senior Specialist in Finishing, and Michael Harris, Beer Processing Specialist.
The woman survived. The group said they didn’t catch her full name, but learned she was a tourist visiting Colorado.
She was one of two tubers rescued from Clear Creek Friday, according to the Golden Fire Department.
Both tubers were transported to the hospital in fair condition.
The group said they were glad they rescued the woman where they did.
“If she would have went down any further, she would have been in a lot worse shape than she was,” Cordova said.
The employees said they don’t all work together in the brewery, but came together as a team to respond to this emergency.
“It’s just good to see people come together,” said Harris. “We all work together, but we don’t know each other. We all work in different departments. It’s good to see people come together in a tense situation.”
“We were in the right place at the right time, these guys reacted perfect,” Gomez said.
Harmon added, the group hopes the tuber they rescued recovers quickly.
“We hope she does well, and hope she gets better and comes back to Colorado,” she said.
Monday morning, a 50-year old man from Arizona died while rafting on Clear Creek near Idaho Springs.
Also on Monday, officials in Jefferson County and the City of Golden announced restricted access to Clear Creek, due to increased snow melt and fast-moving water. Authorities banned swimming and tubing on the water and recommended extreme caution for other water activities until the water returns to safer levels.
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