MISHAWAKA — Emergency crews rescued a man after he drove his car into the St. Joseph River Monday afternoon.

The car ended up in the river after a collision on Lincoln Way East that was witnessed by a police officer.

Several police officers went into the river to rescue the driver, followed minutes later by firefighters.

Assistant Police Chief Mike Samp said the incident unfolded at the River View 500 apartment complex in the 500 block of Lincoln Way East, just east of downtown, when a passing Mishawaka Police officer spotted the driver of a maroon vehicle just as it struck the rear of a parked Buick Century on Lincoln Way.

"The officer activated his lights and siren and turned around to pull the driver over," Samp said. "The car pulled into the parking lot of the apartments."

But the driver did not pull over. Instead, the car accelerated rapidly down a hill into the parking lot behind the high-rise complex, striking a parked car before crashing through a pair of guardrails and plunging into the river.

Samp said the car was moving fast enough to become airborne as it headed into the river.

"You can see an indentation in the last guardrail when the rear tire just barely hit," Samp said.

Samp said one occupant was pulled from the sunken car and taken to the hospital. The condition of the victim was not immediately available.

After the accident, groups of onlookers crowded the rail of the nearby Cedar Street bridge, watching dive teams search the river in the vicinity of the sunken car. Most had come to the bridge to see what the commotion was about in the wake of the incident.

But for those who witnessed it, the sight of the accident was surreal.

"I looked up and saw a car flying over the edge into the river," said Robert Wisser, administrator of the Mishawaka Moose Lodge on the north side of the river. "I was inside and happened to look up."

"The car stayed afloat two or three minutes before it nosed down," he said.

He saw police officers — "about three of them" — go into the water almost immediately.

Fire department divers weren’t far behind them.

Beulah Schwenk, a resident of the complex, was relaxing on the porch near the front door of the high rise with friends when she witnessed the initial accident along Lincoln Way.

"We saw him hit the car on the street, and then he was just gone," she said. "It all happened so fast."