Tracy Sanford thought it was odd when she saw a “mangled” bicycle and a tennis shoe lying in the middle of Old Federal Road South Saturday night.

Sanford pulled her car over to find a boy with multiple injuries lying in a ditch. Georgia State Patrol troopers said the boy was the victim of a hit and run.

The boy, whose name was not being released by officials at the Georgia State Patrol Sunday evening, was airlifted to Erlanger Medical Center in Chattanooga, an operator said. Sanford said the boy was approximately 12 and had what appeared to be a broken leg.

“That is a horrible image to see a 12-year-old boy lying there,” Sanford said. “He was alert. He wanted his momma.”

Sanford, her son and one of her friends were driving home after eating supper in Chatsworth. About a mile after turning onto Old Federal Road from Highway 52, they saw the bicycle and the tennis shoe.

“They were in the middle of the road,” she said. “We pulled in a driveway there and found him lying face down in that ditch. If it hadn’t been for that bicycle and tennis shoe we would have just drove on past him.”

Sanford said the boy told her he was trying to get away from some dogs that were chasing him and either a green or a blue pickup truck struck him.

A description of the vehicle from the state patrol was not available Sunday evening because an incident report was not ready, an operator said.

Anyone with information is asked to call the Georgia State Patrol post in Calhoun at (706) 624-1477.