Conroe, Texas, Mayor Duke Coon presented the Carnegie Medal to Robert E. Chance at a March 26th presentation held during a Conroe city council meeting at city hall.
Chance was awarded the medal in September 2025 after he rescued a man from a submerging vehicle during a flood in Spring, Texas, on May 28, 2024.
During heavy rainfall, 53-year-old Jeffrey Jones attempted to exit a flooded parking lot in poor visibility when he unintentionally drove into a drainage channel. His vehicle was pulled along the channel by fast-moving water before it came to rest atop a submerged pipe and against the dividing column of a concrete culvert. Robert E. Chance, 38, was returning to a worksite for his job as a contractor when he drove over the culvert where Jones was stuck. Seeing Jones inside pounding on the windshield, Chance retrieved a small homemade sledgehammer. He then jumped from the road to the rain-slicked hood of the truck. Chance attempted to break the windshield with the hammer but was unsuccessful. He then climbed onto the roof and lowered himself into the bed of the truck. From there, Chance indicated to Jones that he was going to break the rear passenger window after he determined the rear windshield would be too small. With one strike of the hammer, Chance shattered the window and Jones climbed into the rear of the truck’s cab, Jones then moved to exit through the opening and placed his right foot on the windowsill. Chance helped steady Jones by leaning over the truck bed’s rail. He extended his right arm through the window opening to assist Jones and then helped him move into the truck’s bed. Both men climbed onto the roof of the truck and onto the hood where a bystander brought a collapsible ladder that they used to climb from the truck’s hood to safety atop the culvert.
At the presentation, Chance was joined by his wife and had the opportunity to speak after receiving his medal. He took the moment to respond to people who wondered what made him act to save the life of another, explaining that it was just his natural instinct.
“My life is not above another. I don’t tell people to go out there and save people’s lives, or put theirs in danger, but I would do it. Again and again. Over and over,” Chance said.