Bodycam footage recorded on November 19, 2024, at 15:12:08 shows a rescuer kneeling in driving rain beside a swollen roadside flood channel, carefully clearing wet branches and debris from around a young spotted fawn too weak to free herself, as muddy water surges past just feet away and emergency vehicles wait with lights flashing up on the road.

The video, filmed entirely from the rescuer’s chest-mounted bodycam, opens looking down at the fawn where she lies pinned in a tangle of wet brush, grass and flood debris at the channel’s edge. Her spotted coat is soaked and muddied, her breathing faint, and she is too exhausted to struggle. The rescuer, wearing a purple waterproof rescue jacket, black gloves and black waterproof pants with rescue gear clipped at his waist, is already kneeling beside her, both hands hovering carefully at the edges of the tangle.

Rather than pulling the fawn free, he works the debris itself loose. One sharp stick at a time, one tangled branch after another, his gloved hands clear the trap away from her body — avoiding the thorns and snapped wood pressed against her legs while the flood channel roars beside them. The fawn watches him weakly and trembles, but she does not panic.

In the closing seconds, the last of the debris comes away from her front legs and side. The rescuer’s hands come to rest gently on either side of her, supporting her head and keeping her calm and low on the cleared ground between his knees, the rushing water still visible at the edge of the frame and red and blue emergency lights reflecting off the wet road above. She lies free at last — still soaked, still tired, but no longer trapped, with help already waiting nearby.

Wildlife specialists remind the public never to approach a fawn in floodwater themselves: fast-moving channels can rise suddenly and debris conceals sharp hazards, and a frightened wild animal can injure itself struggling. Calling local emergency or wildlife rescue services — and keeping a safe distance until they arrive — gives animals like this fawn the best chance of a calm, careful rescue like the one captured here.