There were several New Year’s babies this year, but few got quite the welcome that little Anastasia received. Born just an hour after the stroke of midnight, she had fireworks and a police chase!
Her dad, Carl Alewine, had been at work on New Year’s Eve when his fiancée, Tiffani Von Glahn, called. Her contractions were getting closer, and she was pretty sure she’d gone into labor. Carl rushed home – not just because Tiffany was in labor, but also because her pregnancy was high-risk. The nearest hospital that could treat her was an hour away.
Armed with his cellphone, Carl picked up Tiffani and started making his way to the hospital. He had them on the line to warn them that she was coming. She was supposed to receive a cesarean. But then it started to look like they weren’t going to make it in time, so Carl picked up the pace.
“Right when I get on the on the ramp of the interstate, I hear a loud splash and hear her scream that her water broke, and my foot just hit the gas,” Carl, 27, told PEOPLE. “That’s what really made me go—I was very nervous. I was on the phone with the hospital with her screaming in the background, and I was hauling ass!”
Driving over 90 miles an hour down the freeway, Carl quickly drew the attention of the authorities.
“I looked at Tiffani, I looked at the cops, and she’s screaming,” Alewine said. “She says, ‘Babe, please don’t stop!’ So, what are you going to do, you know? I’m thinking, ‘I’m going to go to jail tonight.’”
Hoping that they were escorts, he flipped on his emergency flashers and tried dialing highway patrol, but he wasn’t able to get a connection. So, he kept driving. It wasn’t until the car came around a turn and he saw the police barricade that he realized something wasn’t quite right.
“The hospital told me I could pull over and wait for an ambulance, but I knew if we waited, Tiffani could get hurt, or the baby could get hurt,” he said. “Pulling over just wasn’t an option, I would have taken going to jail.”
He’d gotten about 15 minutes into the chase before police used a defensive maneuver. They had his Jeep surrounded and a blockade. He tried yelling out the window to let them know that his fiancée was in labor, but an officer approached the vehicle, gun drawn, and demanded that he exit the vehicle. Carl was then placed into handcuffs.
Only then did someone notice the screaming woman in labor.
Thankfully, one of the officer’s father was a former EMT firefighter, and he had been along for the ride. He performed a roadside delivery that saved both Anastasia and Tiffani. Carl sat on the hood of a police car, fireworks going off, watching the whole thing.
“I’m watching it the whole time, I’m on the hood of the car, in handcuffs, watching my child be born, it’s New Year’s and the fireworks displays are going on all around us, blue lights flashing and I’m crying tears of joy,” Alewine said. “I wasn’t even thinking about being arrested.”
With Anastasia delivered safely (precisely 1:03 a.m. on New Year’s Day), Carl was released from his cuffs and the entire police crew burst into applause. The family then went on to the hospital, which is where Anastasia remains. Doctors are monitoring her vitals.
