Car lands in Deer Isle mudflats

Rescue crews pull unconscious driver and trapped passenger from car

The Hyundai after it came to a rest in mudflats. Photo courtesy of the Hancock County Sheriff’s Office.

Aug. 24, 2026

By Jessi Hardy

The car went over this embankment before hitting the mudflats. Photo courtesy of the Hancock County Sheriff’s Office.

First responders launched a rescue operation on North Deer Isle Road on Aug. 20 after a Hyundai Ioniq veered off the road, plowed through a backyard, and plunged down a steep embankment into the mudflats.

The Hancock County Sheriff’s Office said the car missed a turn after the driver may have suffered a medical event shortly after 8 a.m. The driver was found unconscious and the passenger trapped inside the partially submerged vehicle. which pulled a poplar tree with it into the shallow water.

Emergency crews from the Deer Isle, Stonington, and Sedgwick fire departments, along with Memorial Ambulance and the Hancock County Sheriff’s Department, successfully extricated the two passengers and transported them to the hospital where they were treated for non-life threatening injuries, according to the sheriff’s office.

My Boys Towing of Deer Isle was called to extract the vehicle from the mudflats before the incoming tide.

—John Epstein contributed to this story.