Heroes to be honored Wednesday

LEHI — When David Maughan and his wife, Jan, drive to the Little America Hotel in Salt Lake City for lunch this Wednesday, you can be sure of one thing.

They will not take it for granted when they arrive safely.

The Maughans will be honored Wednesday at the Freedoms Foundation Heroes/National Awards Luncheon. Every year the Utah Chapter of the Freedoms Foundation at Valley Forge finds people who did something heroic during the past 12 months and gives them the praise they have coming.

This year it's the Maughans. This past November, following the first big snowstorm of the year, they skidded to a stop on an icy road in Summit County and rescued a family of seven whose van had slid off the road and plunged into a lake.

Only the rear end of the van was above water when they got to the scene. Through the back window they could see that the Tiberius family – Charles and Anna Marie and their five children, all under the age of 9 — was trapped inside.

David and Jan launched into action, along with their 23-year-old son Derek, their 15-year-old daughter Jaimie and Jaimie's two friends, Kacie Pontius and Jessica Babcock.

David ran up the embankment, stepped to the edge of the lake, and first tried to break the back window with his elbow. Nothing doing. In the meantime, a man living in a nearby cabin also arrived on the scene and, after assessing the situation, ran back to his cabin for a hammer.

Inside the van, as he pushed his children toward the back window, Charles Tiberius screamed for help!

David shouted back with the information that the cabin owner had gone to get a hammer.

No time, pled Charles. Water was pouring in and they were sinking fast.

At that point, as Jan was hurriedly throwing out all the luggage in the back of their Acura in an attempt to find the jack, Jaimie dug underneath the snow and found a rock about an inch in diameter. Maybe that would break the window. She threw it to her brother, who showed it to his dad.

"Too small," David said, and Derek dropped the rock.

But wait a minute, that's all they had.

"Better throw me that rock," said David and Derek dug through the snow, found it, and tossed it over.

David first tried jabbing the rock at the window but he had no leverage.