A woman gave birth to an 11-pound baby on the side of a freeway in California Saturday morning.
Sitting in the passenger seat of a Chevy Tahoe while her husband drove, Sandra Vilchez began having contractions. Their baby girl wasn’t due until September 26 , but she had other plans, the New York Daily News revealed in its report.
Sandra and her family went to visit her mother; they were driving from Wildomar to Downey when the 29-year-old started feeling labor pains.
Speaking with the Ocean County Register , Sandra shareed her initial reaction.
“I told my husband, ‘I think she’s coming now.’”
Bolivar Vilchez was “terrified” at the thought of his wife having her baby while they were on the road. When her water broke before they could make it to the hospital, they knew it was sink or swim. A baby was about to be delivered!
Bolivar, a Marine Corps veteran, pulled over on the 91 Freeway that was close to Kraemer Boulevard. A 911 operator helped the nervous father deliver his baby daughter. His wife successfully gave birth to the girl, who weighed 11 pounds, 6 ounces. The couple named her Savannah. She also measured 22-inches.
Paramedics arrived in time to cut the baby’s umbilical cord. The mom and baby were transported to Kaiser Permanente Anaheim Medical Center.
While Sandra was giving birth to Savannah with the help of her husband coaching her through the process, the couple’s other children were in the middle row of the vehicle. Their ages are 6, 4, and 3.
“The whole time, I said, ‘We’re fine, we’re fine,’” Sandra says.
She adds that the whole experience was “shocking.”
Baby Savannah was born at 4:21 a.m. Her husband checked to be sure that the umbilical cord wasn’t wrapped around Savannah’s neck before he placed the baby on Sandra’s chest.
When the family left their home in Orange County to visit Sandra’s mother, they thought nothing about a 12-hour drive to Downey. They didn’t think for one moment that the baby was about to make her arrival a week before her due date.
The mother goes on to share that things became real during the birth when Savannah’s head “popped out.”
“I thought we had half an hour, but no, she decided to come by the time we hit Kraemer (Boulevard),” Sandra explains. “As we were passing Kraemer, her head popped out.”
Fortunately, everything went well during the birth of the 11-pound baby girl born in a car along the freeway.
[Image via New York Daily News ]