Mrs Dearden and Mr Kelm are among 17 medal recipients and 83 Australian Bravery Award winners announced by the Governor-General yesterday.
The awards recognise courage, sacrifice and selflessness.
Mrs Dearden said she was humbled and surprised by the honour.
“It’s a big surprise because I still don’t really think I did much that I want an award for,” she said.
“I just reacted. Afterwards, it did go through my mind that my father was in intensive care in The Alfred, in an induced coma, and that my husband and kids were at home and might have got a phone call saying, ‘she’s dead’.
“I was the first person on the scene and I just jumped into action.
“At the time it didn’t seem scary, although Tim told me later I was running around like a headless chook.
“I have no idea how long the whole thing took. I can see every single step, clearly. It seemed like half an hour, but Tim said it was over a lot quicker than that.”
Mrs Dearden was heading to football training when a vehicle veered off the highway, travelled across a lane of oncoming traffic and crashed into a large tree.
The car flipped on its side before coming to rest on the highway.
Mrs Dearden and others stopped their vehicles and she ran to the damaged car as another driver called triple zero.
While Mrs Dearden can recall the event in slow motion, for Mr Kelm, it was ‘very fast and quick’.
“I remember approaching the accident,” he said.
“I could see a car on its side, a four-wheel-drive, with flames coming out of the bonnet.
“I could tell by the way people were racing and in a hurry there was still somebody inside.
“I had a four-feet piece of pipe in my toolbox, and a big hammer, and I grabbed them.
“I suppose I summed it up in about two seconds, I’m going to have to smash a window somewhere.”
Mrs Dearden said flames were coming from several points on the vehicle and she was struggling to break a window, after unsuccessfully trying to open the car door.
“When Tim came walking towards me with a pipe, I told him later, ‘I could have kissed you’,” she said.
“Although, to be honest, if I came across him in a dark alley I would have run the other way.
“I usually have a kit in the back of the ute, which would have had something to break the window, but I’d taken it out. I had nothing.”
Mr Kelm said he ran up and smashed the four-wheel-drive’s sunroof.
While he and Mrs Dearden were able to remove the child from the vehicle, the driver remained trapped.
“We couldn’t get her out,” he said.
“We – somehow – managed to lever the four-wheel-drive up and drag her out under the right-hand window. She was trapped with her feet under the pedals.”
Shortly after, the car was engulfed in flames.
Mr Kelm said receiving a Bravery Medal for his efforts was humbling.
“It’s the last thing on your mind when you’re approaching an accident – or any time, really,” he said.
“Looking this far back, it’s humbling. It won’t change anything, but it’s humbling to be recognised.”
Mrs Dearden said although she lived in the same community as the mother and daughter, she would never approach them about what happened.
“The woman sent me a letter after it happened, thanking me,” she said.
“The girl who was in that car accident goes to the local school and I see her achievements all the time in the local paper and the school newsletter.
“To see that girl, now, winning races, winning awards and growing up – it makes you realise how special life is and how special family is.
“Getting the medal after all this time has made me think about it all again. It makes you realise how precious life is.
“I keep saying to people, ‘you should stop and smell the roses’.”
Mrs Dearden said she wanted to remind Wimmera people about how lucky they were to be part of a community.
“It is special,” she said.
“It’s a scary time, with everything that is happening now in Australia with the coronavirus.
“A lot of our communities, like Edenhope, have ageing populations. We’ve all got to stick together and help people out.”
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