MASON — Terri Hopton almost died right here a year ago, in a heavy rush of rainwater that swept her into a steel drain pipe and spit her out 36 feet later on the other side of the road.

        “Jesus, I can't believe this is how you're going to take me,” Ms. Hopton remembers thinking as she disappeared into the dark pipe no wider than the length of a tennis racket. “I'm going to die in a pipe at the ATP.”

Terri Hopton shows the drainage pipe she was pulled into last year during a storm. She was under water for more than 3 minutes. (Tony Jones photo) | ZOOM |

        She had been directing traffic at the ATP Tennis Center as a volunteer at Cincinnati's Tennis Masters Series event, which returns to town Monday. A rainstorm that dumped 4 inches of rain in an hour had flooded the courts, parking lots and even some cars, postponing a semifinal match at one of tennis' premier events and sending patrons scurrying to the exits.

        As the current pulled her underwater and eventually through the 24-inch culvert opening, Ms. Hopton was sure she going to drown. She thought about her funeral. She wondered where they'd find her body. She worried about the five members of her Christian music and drama group who had watched in horror as their director fought for her life.

        Ms. Hopton survived.

        “A miracle,” she calls it. “Obviously, God has more he wants me to do.”

        Ms. Hopton is already back on the scene at the tennis center, volunteering for a 10th straight year, supervising her parking lots since the Seniors tournament began Thursday night. Some 135,000 people are expected during the Western & Southern Financial Group Masters main draw over the next seven days.

        For Ms. Hopton, it will be hard to ever match the memory of last year.

"Terri's gone under water'

        That Saturday night, two storms knocked down signs and sponsor tents, beginning about 8 p.m. Competition between Gustavo Kuerten and Tim Henman was postponed in the second set. Thousands of fans tried to flee the ATP Tennis Center. Ms. Hopton, then 40, was working the parking lot with five members of Mishpachah, the local Christian group that she directs. Ms. Hopton and other volunteers were trying to let cars out one at a time down the south access road, which runs past Cintas and out to Western Row. By then, the rain had all but stopped, but roughly 20 cars already were under water in the volunteer parking lot.

        Jessica Snyder, a member of the music group, was looking for her car. Ms. Hopton yelled to her and moved toward the parking lot. The water was so deep, Ms. Hopton couldn't see the end of the road. She slipped, fell and was immediately sucked into the culvert by the current.

LOTS THAT FLOODED WON'T BE USED

The Western & Southern Financial Group Masters main draw begins Monday.     The two parking lots that flooded during last year's event won't be used this year, facilities manager Dick Clark said. One was the volunteer lot just off the south road into the ATP Tennis Center. The other is the driving range at the Golf Center at Kings Island. Mr. Clark said just more than 100 spaces will be lost.

        Her left leg shot into the pipe. She was face down under water and pushing with her left arm on top of the culvert, trying to prevent the rest of her body from going in. She fought for about 2 1/2 minutes. Then she closed her eyes and let go.

        “I'm going to die,” she thought.

        As soon as she let go, her right leg shot into the culvert and was ripped open by a bolt. She could feel the hard ridges of the pipe as she traveled all the way through it. Her arms were getting torn up as well. She was told she was completely under water for 3 1/2 minutes.

        Nicole Viox, another music group member, tried to wade into the water after Ms. Hopton. Allan Dierker, 33, who has commercial diving experience, heard screaming while he was sitting on the trunk of his car, the front end of which was submerged. He rushed to the scene, helped Miss Viox out of harm's way and started to look for Ms. Hopton.

        “I jumped in and started feeling around,” Mr. Dierker says. “I was down on my knees in the water.”

        The current started pulling him in. His left leg was stuck in the culvert.

        Sandy Hauser, who had been working beside Ms. Hopton, got on her radio and shouted, “Terri's gone under water! We can't find her!”

        By this time, cars had turned on their brights to get more light, and volunteers were shining flashlights.

        “I went under the road and came all the way through,” Ms. Hopton says. “It was like a water ride. It spit me out the other end. I thought, "OK, if this is like an undertow, maybe if I relax my body, I'll come up for air.' Sure enough, that's what happened. Not at one point did I ever freak or panic.”

        About 40 to 50 feet away was another culvert. It was maybe 6 feet wide and solid concrete. It would have taken Ms. Hopton under Interstate 71 and into the Paramount's Kings Island parking lot. She says she knew she couldn't survive that.

        She grabbed a tree branch. It broke. She grabbed another. It broke.

        “I was fighting for my life,” she says. “Sure enough, I grabbed ahold of a branch that held, and I ended up in a tree. I pulled myself up. They said I looked like a koala bear hanging there. I was screaming. But the car horns were so loud, and rushing water was so loud, nobody could hear me.”

        Scott Connor, 25, who works for Home City Ice and had finished making a delivery to the tennis center's food court, saw the commotion surrounding the pipe and approached the scene. He ran to the other side of the road and saw Ms. Hopton in a tree. He thought she was looking for the person who had gone through the culvert.

        Ms. Hopton would not let go of the tree at first. Finally, Mr. Connor and another bystander, Eddie Glacken, moved toward her. They were in 3 or 4 inches of water.

        “She reached for me,” Mr. Connor says. “I just grabbed her.”

        Several other people quickly stepped in to help. Then Mr. Connor and Mr. Glacken went back and freed Mr. Dierker.

        “I'm glad I helped her, but everybody made it sound like I did this big heroic deed,” Mr. Connor says. “She pretty much saved herself. I just happened to be standing there on the road.”

Treated and released

        Ms. Hopton kept saying, “I'm OK.” She didn't want her music group to worry. Thinking she was headed to the hospital for a long stay, she kept mentioning that someone had to take care of her dogs, Bear and Barkley.

        “She was probably the calmest of anybody,” co-worker Mickey Samon says.

        Ms. Hopton couldn't stop shaking. She was freezing cold and babbling nonstop. She apologized to Dick Clark, facilities manager and volunteer coordinator for the tennis tournament, for dropping her two-way radio and losing it. She worried aloud about the volunteer schedule for the next day.

        “Can you imagine that?” tournament chairman Paul Flory says. “I just can't say enough nice things about her. What bravery. She's an example, to me, of the people that are out there that you don't hear much about.”

        Ms. Hopton was taken by golf cart to a first aid station at the tennis center, where an ambulance was waiting. Then she was rushed to Bethesda North Hospital. Doctors told her it was miraculous that after such a long time under water she had no water in her lungs. They told her, “You shouldn't be alive.”

        “They thought my legs were broken and my hips were broken,” Ms. Hopton says. “When they got me into X-ray, I couldn't move my legs. But not one thing was broken. They said it was like I went through a meat grinder. I couldn't even push a grocery cart for two months with my left arm.”

        Ms. Hopton was released from the hospital at 3 a.m. She was bruised from neck to toes. She was on her back for a week and couldn't wear shoes for a month because her feet and ankles were cut so badly.

        Her mom helped her during that period. Ms. Hopton is a single woman, although she refers to her Mishpachah members as “my kids.” She quit her job with a graphic design company in 1993 and took about a 50 percent pay cut to direct the group full time. She has worked with the nonprofit organization since 1984.

        “They worship this woman,” Ms. Samon says of the Mishpachah members. “They were surprised she wasn't walking on water.”

        Ms. Hopton turned down post-trauma counseling during the last year saying it wasn't necessary. The only visible remains of the incident are the scar on the left side of her right knee where the bolt punctured her skin and a 6-inch scar down the back of her leg. Friends have suggested plastic surgery. Ms. Hopton says she considers the scars a reminder that she is “alive and breathing.”

Ready to go again

        Ms. Hopton was surprised by visits to her home by tournament officials, including Mr. Flory and associate tournament director Elaine Bruening. Mr. Clark brought her a tournament jacket. Mr. Craig brought yellow roses.

        “She's been an extremely loyal, helpful, supportive manager of those parking lots,” Mr. Craig says. “She's a great friend to all of us.

        “Certainly, we were not only concerned about her, that she survived, but how she was doing afterward. A lesser person might have had some mental trauma. It's just another side of her; she's a very strong, controlled woman.”

        Ms. Hopton says the tournament paid all medical expenses not covered by her insurance company. She was touched by the genuine concern of those who visited. She says Mr. Flory did not need to come to her home. She calls what happened “a freak accident” and says nobody is to blame.

        As for this year's tournament, Ms. Hopton says, “People are worried that the first time it rains, I'm going to have this big, emotional meltdown.”

        Well, what if it does rain?

        “I'm going to the clubhouse,” she says. “I don't care if there are 3,000 cars out here.”

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