Woman Rescued in Ravine

Police are searching for a man who allegedly tried to break his former girlfriend’s neck and then pushed her into a deep ravine near Irvine, where she lay tangled in a tree branch for hours before being rescued Wednesday morning.

Police said the 33-year-old Santa Ana woman, whose name was not released, had agreed to take a drive with her former boyfriend about 7 a.m. Wednesday, although a restraining order has been issued against him. They drove to a secluded area west of Limestone Canyon Regional Park on Hicks Canyon Haul Road.

Police said the man tried to break her neck and then pushed her off the cliff. She landed in a tree jutting from a small ledge about 25 feet from a cliff, a Sheriff’s Department spokesman said.

Three bicyclists heard a woman crying for help shortly before 11 a.m. and called rescue workers.

“She was very lucky,” fire Capt. Steve Miller said. Had the tree not broken her fall, she would have tumbled at least 50 feet farther, he said.

It took rescue workers more than an hour to lift the semiconscious woman from the face of the ravine, using a mesh and metal basket, a ladder truck and other equipment. Her vital signs were stable, but she suffered “moderate trauma,” Miller said.

“She was extremely calm. She was definitely scratched up and complained of back pain and neck pain,” Miller said. “If it hadn’t been for those [cyclists], she could have perished.”

She was taken to Western Medical Center-Santa Ana. Hospital officials said her injuries were not life-threatening.

The former boyfriend, whom police declined to name, fled in a white GMC extended cab pickup.