Pennsylvania girl, 12, survives being swept through flooded drainpipe

FRACKVILLE, Pa. -- A 12-year-old eastern Pennsylvania girl is home from the hospital with bumps and bruises after being swept several hundred yards through a flooded drainpipe.

Taylor Russell, of Frackville, says she was checking out flooding at the drainpipe late Monday. She didn't notice a drop in the ground and got pulled under.

She tells WNEP-TV it was "just scary, dark, scary." She says she held her breath the whole time, afraid she would drown.

Police and public works officials told The Republican-Herald in Pottsville the girl was underground in the pipe for about 200 yards before emerging into Little Mahanoy Creek. She was washed several hundred more yards downstream before her rescue.

The girl says she came out of the pipe thinking, "somebody pinch me, I'm still alive."