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Iowa high school student saves man trapped in ditch

MARION COUNTY, Iowa– An Iowa high school senior is credited with saving a man’s life. Jacob Best was driving along rural Highway G76 southeast of De...

MARION COUNTY, Iowa-- An Iowa high school senior is credited with saving a man's life.

Jacob Best was driving along rural Highway G76 southeast of Des Moines Wednesday, May 10th, when he spotted a man trapped in a ditch on the side of the road.

"It just caught my eye, and I didn't think something was right," Best recalls. He said he had to do a double-take. “I was just going down the road and saw kind of a glimpse of somebody with their hand up in the ditch."

That arm pointing in the air belonged to 37-year-old John Tyler, who landed in a ditch after his motorcycle crashed into a deer. He was bleeding from the head and unable to move.

“I asked if he was okay,” Best said. “He said he wasn't and was pretty messed up, so I called 911.” Best stayed with Tyler until medics arrived. He was the only person who noticed Tyler in the over six hours he spent in the ditch.

“It was especially raining around here and he could have drowned in that ditch,” Best said.

Best said it was upsetting to see Tyler in such bad shape, and he still cannot shake the image from his mind. “I have never seen anything like that before,” Best said. “His motorcycle was completely totaled.”

Tyler is now in intensive care at Mercy Medical Center in Des Moines. Hospital officials say he is in serious but stable condition.

The Marion County Sheriff's Office is still investigating the crash.

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