My Son, My Hero
I am one proud mama tonight! My son did something at work today that impressed me, but did not surprise me.
Andrew is a 17 year old Junior Volunteer Firefighter who has been trained in Fundamentals of Firefighting, first aid, CPR, hazmat awareness, and Incident Command, etc. He takes his position in the fire department very seriously.
Andrew worked today from 4pm to 10pm. At around 6:30pm, his friend Steve's minitor went off. They heard the call for a vehicle into a structure at McDonald's, which is right across the street from where Andrew works. They looked over and saw that a car had crashed into the side of the McDonald's. Andrew's friend bluelighted it to the fire station, while Andrew's co-workers told Andrew to go. He grabbed a pair of gloves and ran over to the McDonalds. When he arrived on scene, he approached the police officer and fire chief (from a different department) and told them he was trained in first aid and CPR. Andrew asked them if he could help out and they told him to "go ahead". He assessed the scene for safety and approached the vehicle.
The driver was the only patient in the car. The car had entered the building up to the windshield. Andrew told the patient that he was trained, and asked him if he could help him, which is procedure. The patient could not respond. Andrew told him he was going to take his pulse and the patient blinked his eyes. Andrew took his pulse, checked his respirations, and started asking questions to see if the patient was alert. Andrew didn't recognize the patient at first because his face was covered in blood. As he worked on the patient, he realized that he is a fellow classmate. He also knew that the patient has a heart problem because he had taken care of him in school in a different incident.
At this time the ambulance arrived and Andrew gave the EMT the patient's vitals and told her of his heart condition. Assured that the patient was in good hands, Andrew walked back to work, followed procedure for cleaning up, and got back to work.
So why am I so impressed? Because Andrew didn't think twice about helping a stranger, he jumped into action when the other people on scene didn't, he had enough sense to follow procedure, and he did not panic. But what really impresses me is this: when I told Andrew that he is my hero, he said, "I'm not a hero. I was just doing my job."
Andrew, you are my hero! I am so proud of you! And I love you very much!
