TYLER - Two Tyler residents died Sunday night when their car rolled into a pond. Police and neighbors found Jake and Betty Smith inside their car in the Woodlake pond. That's along the 3800 block of Woodlake Drive.

A dark night, in a dimly lit neighborhood, where the moon is normally the only light around.

"here we actually have fireflies and you can see the stars at night," one neighbor said.

But, Sunday night the flashing lights weren't the fireflies. Instead, the neighborhood was lit up by flashing lights from Tyler Police, Fire and Rescue Units.

Neighbors like Doug Marshall say it's a quiet neighborhood, but not on this chilly night.

He says, "i'm sitting there and I hear this car. It sounded like a truck with a trailer just flying down the road 90 miles an hour. I thought, what are they doing driving so fast down the road. There was a smell of burning rubber."

Around 9:20 a white Pontiac lost control. Marshall ran out his front door to find car tracks in his front yard.

"these car tracks are what's left to show how the car came from the top of this hill and barreled into the pond."

That's when Marshall called 911.

"I said God, they're in the pond. They're in the pond. I thought what do you do. There's people drowning under the water and what do you do."

Marshall says he made a quick decision to jump into the water to try and save who he thought were strangers.

Officials say the vehicle was completely submerged underwater. By the time rescue crews arrived on the scene the car's headlights that once had shown through the water had gone out.

Don Martin, of the Tyler Police Department, says "the female had submerged to the top and the driver was still down in the vehicle."

The volunteer fire department dive team dressed in scuba gear joined Marshall in the pond. Marshall says the male driver was finally pulled from the car and that's when he realized it was Jake Smith and his wife Betty. The elderly couple that had lived next door to him for years.

"they were just going down the road and then it all ended."

Stay with KETK for the latest developments.