‘We’re lucky to be alive’: Women recount slamming head-on into water buffalo at 52 mph

STOCKHOLM, N.Y. (WWNY/Gray News) - Two New York women say they are lucky to be alive after they crashed head-on into a water buffalo on their way home from a church event.

Kristen Rozelle, 50, was driving Lindsey Baker, 27, home from a church event around 7 p.m. Saturday when their Jeep collided head-on with a water buffalo in the town of Stockholm.

“If you look at my Jeep, we’re lucky to be alive. Literally, if I did not have a Jeep Limited, I’d be dead,” Rozelle said.

Rozelle said she was traveling 52 mph before hitting the water buffalo that weighed about 2,300 pounds, according to a state trooper. She said it felt like hitting a freight train.

“All of a sudden, I just see black. I didn’t see anything at all. And then, boom,” she said. “We didn’t know it was even there.”

“I’m like, ‘What did we hit?’” Baker said.

Good Samaritans helped after the crash

Rozelle said she passed out briefly after the crash. When she came to, smoke from the deployed airbags made her think the Jeep was on fire. The airbags blocked the door handles, making it difficult to get out.

Baker said she saw the airbags and smoke and heard Rozelle yelling to get out of the Jeep.

“I turned to see, and then, she’s panicking. She can’t get out, so I checked to see if she was still buckled. She wasn’t,” Baker said.

Baker said she got out of the Jeep.

“I ran into the road to get help, to wave the car down,” she said. “Thankfully, there were some people who came, and I directed them to where we were.”

Those good Samaritans helped the two women until first responders arrived and took them to the hospital.

“The people were so wonderful and beautiful to help us,” Rozelle said. “That’s the real story here is just that humanness. When we needed it the most, they were there.”

Rozelle said she sustained sprains and bruises throughout her body, along with cuts on her leg and hand, while Baker said she had bruises on her legs and chest.

“We didn’t walk out of this with nothing,” Rozelle said. “We’re struggling each in our own way.”

A water buffalo?

An eyewitness told Rozelle he saw the water buffalo run across a field and jump the guardrail toward her Jeep. The animal died in the crash.

Rozelle said seeing photos of her crumpled Jeep reinforced just how serious this incident was.

“I knew I was lucky. But when I saw the Jeep, I realized how much more. God’s arms were around me. There’s no other way to express that,” she said. “My Jeep is this huge vehicle, and it was crumpled to nothing in a moment’s notice.”

Baker said she was stunned after learning what they had hit.

“I was in disbelief,” she said. “It had horns. It was black, and that’s all I could see from when the ambulance turned to head to the hospital.”

Rozelle said she wants the focus to remain on the women’s survival, rather than the animal involved.

“I want people to see the Jeep and not the bull anymore,” Rozelle said. “Our lives are worth something... We’re alive. And that’s a miracle. Absolute miracle.”

State police said the owner of the water buffalo, who lives near the crash site, spoke with a trooper at the scene.

Rozelle said she has heard nothing from the owner.

“The only thing that I know is that nobody’s reached out to us,” she said. “And they knew that we almost died... On a human component of it, that’s just a really hard thing.”

Water buffalo, originating from parts of Asia, can weigh more than a ton and stand 6 feet tall.