Man Rescued From Submerged SUV During Friday's Deluge: Highway Supe

MATTITUCK, NY — Tragedy was averted Friday when Southold Town Highway Superintendent Vincent Orlando came to the aid of a stranded motorist who was submerged in a recharge basin after his SUV was swept away in Friday's torrential downpour.

Orlando said he was headed down Bray Avenue near the recharge basin when he saw the vehicle. "I said, 'Oh, my God, there's someone in there,'" he said. "The water picked up his car and swept him into the recharge basin."

He got out of his truck and helped the middle-aged man out of the vehicle, Orlando said; the man, while shaken, refused medical attention.

Orlando drove the driver, a summer resident, to his home.

"I'm just glad I happened to be there. The water was rushing like a river," Orlando said.

Four inches of rain fell in Mattituck in one hour, Orlando said; the town's drain's are designed to handle two inches an hour.

Friday's deluge brought townwide flooding on Routes 25 and 48; even the area by Handy Pantry in Mattituck was completely impassable, something Orlando said he has not seen before. "It was unbelievable," he said.

And with rain expected again tonight and the ground saturated, he predicted, "It's not going to be good."

Of his rescue, Orlando said, "Someone sent me down that road, a higher being than us. I'm just glad I was there to help him."