On a cold January morning in Highlands Ranch, five Mountain Vista High School students became heroes when they evacuated passengers involved in a rollover crash.

While driving to school at around 7:30 a.m. on Jan. 27, Amadou Bah, Ibrahima Bah, Abdulai Bah, Kasper Skonieczny and Ousmane Balde sprung into action after witnessing a rollover crash during rush hour at Wildcat Reserve Parkway and Poston Parkway.

The five quickly and safely evacuated a father and daughter inside the overturned vehicle, according to the Douglas County Sheriff’s Office. The father and daughter, not at fault in the crash, weren’t seriously injured, a sheriff’s office spokesperson said.

A family in the other vehicle was also helped from their wrecked vehicle by the students, until first responders arrived on scene and took over. Bodycam footage from DCSO deputies show first responders interacting with the student heroes during the crash investigation.

Amadou Bah, a junior, was driving through the intersection, when he, his brother and cousin witnessed a car “tumbling and tumbling, and then everyone around just stops,” Amadou said at a commemoration event at the high school Thursday.

Despite having a sprained ankle, Amadou and the four other teenagers rushed to the crash scene.

Bah said: “Next to me is my brother, my cousin starts running, and then I see Kasper. We get up to the first car door, the one that flipped, and then we’re like, prying it open, trying to get it open, because after it flipped (the door) bent. After we get it open, we move around the airbags. And this girl is just confused … she was like ‘what’s going on? What is this? Where’s my lunch box?’”

The student said the group then helped a family out of the other vehicle involved.

“I’m just very thankful to be there that day, just to help out the girl, her dad,” Ibrahima Bah, a freshman, said.

Douglas County Sheriff Darren Weekly honored the five students at Mountain Vista Thursday.

“These students display qualities far beyond their years,” Weekly said. “They acted swiftly and without hesitation. They understood that people’s lives were potentially at risk and they were there when it mattered most.”

The sheriff provided the students with commendation “challenge coins,” which is a physical token of gratitude for taking heroic actions typically provided by first responders.

“To have these students be a part of our community, exemplify what we want to be about as a community and taking care of one another, we just want to say thank you. We’re proud of you,” Douglas County School District Assistant Superintendent Danny Windsor told the five students.

In addition to their challenge coins, the five students received gift cards from the families involved in the crash.

“I feel like these types of actions were not just because of me,” Amadou Bah said. “But like any other one, any other person in the school would have displayed the same amount of action.”