Utah (Daily Herald)—Doctors at the University of Utah safely delivered a baby boy after his mother blacked out while driving and crashed into a stone wall in an Eagle Mountain neighborhood.
Both Rachel Hughes, 24, and her newborn son, Beckham, are recovering after Hughes lost consciousness as she drove near Inverness Road and Airey Drive in Eagle Mountain around 10:15 a.m. Thursday.
Her SUV missed a curve in the road, sped across a lawn at approximately 35 mph and crashed into a rock wall outside a home, according to information from the Utah County Sheriff’s Office.
“There was no apparent effort to turn or slow down before the impact,” the press release stated.
Hughes was 27 weeks pregnant and wrote on Facebook that she doesn’t remember anything about the crash until someone carried her out of her car and called 911.
She was flown to the University of Utah hospital where doctors found she had deep bruising on her pelvis, hips, abdomen and right foot.
“I was beyond blessed with no broken bones which shocked my surgeons and myself,” Hughes wrote on Facebook. She said she also had “seatbelt burns which we believe ultimately saved my life in combination of having a limp body due to being unconscious.”
Doctors also found internal bleeding and delivered her 2 pounds and 12 ounces baby through an emergency cesarean section at 1:18 p.m.
“I was able to see him in the NICU later that night and hold my son’s hand for the first time,” Hughes wrote. “It’s the most precious moment I’ve ever experienced in my entire life.”
She and her husband, Hunter, studied at Utah Valley University and were married in 2016. Family members created a GoFundMe page to help the Saratoga Springs family pay for medical expenses.
“There is an overwhelming amount of angels from both sides of the veil in my hospital room and surrounding Beckham in the NICU,” Hughes wrote. “Thank you so much for all of the prayers said on my behalf and for my recovery as well.”
