CENTERVILLE, S.D. — The mother of a baby who was thrown from a van during a rollover crash on Interstate 29 in southeast South Dakota said she thinks it is a miracle her daughter survived.

The 3-month-old infant, Adrianna, was secured in a baby seat when the seat ejected from the van as it lost control on ice and crashed about three miles north of Vermillion last week.

The infant's mother, Trista Voagen, of Centerville, said the car seat was properly buckled in but was thrown from the van anyway.

"When I crawled through the back (of the overturned van) to get to her and I didn't see her I was terrified," Voagen said. "I thought for sure she was going to be gone."

Voagen said she found Adrianna sitting in the upright seat in the ditch, still strapped in with her blanket over her and her toys sitting beside her.

"It was like God picked her up and set her out of the way," said Judy Voagen, Adrianna's grandmother, who was driving the van.

Trista Voagen said the only way to explain it is "somebody watching over us."

Adrianna spent fewer than two days in a Sioux City, Iowa, hospital. Trista Voagen was not injured. Judy Voagen was briefly hospitalized.


Advertisement