Truckload Authority - April/May 2019

hands-free and was running back to check on the car. The horn was blaring
and through the heavy smoke he could see the dazed driver trying to get out
of the car. The motorist had severely broken his leg and his foot was nearly
severed. Blood was gushing from the man’s leg. As the 911 operator told
Melby what to do, the anguished driver told him he had fallen asleep. He
begged him to check on his daughter, who was in the backseat. As a father
himself, Millirans dreaded what he might see. He opened the door and found
a young girl, 9, with a large contusion on her head. She was conscious and
told him her name. As Millirans checked her for other wounds another driver
appeared and reached under the hood, to shut off the blaring horn, which
eased some of the tension.
Millirans helped calm the driver as paramedics worked on him. At one
point, the man passed out. Afterward, Millirans had to take a moment before
getting back on the road. “I wondered if they would be all right,” he said. “The
little girl had been crying in pain, especially when they put her on the gurney.”
Thinking of his own family, the professional truck driver called home.
“When I’m driving along, I rehearse what I might do if something happened,”
Millirans said. “I think doing that helped me that night. I didn’t panic.
You get your thoughts together. You figure out where you’re at, call 911, and
grab a flashlight.”
Although Millirans has a dedicated run from Michigan to Coral Springs,
Florida, that particular week he was sent on a slightly different route through
Florida. “It just so happened that the time I’m on that route, I see that kind of
accident,” he said.
Reeves, of Kissimmee, Florida, a professional truck driver for Stevens
Transport of Dallas, is being recognized for his quick actions in preventing an
accident when his student driver passed out behind the wheel.
At 2:30 p.m. on December 16, 2018, Reeves and his student driver were
on Interstate 74 in Illinois, about a day and a half out from delivering a load
to Pompano, Florida. The student driver was in his
fifth week of training and was driving well. However,
the day before, he hadn’t been feeling well,
complaining of fatigue.
“We stopped for the night so he could get
some sleep,” Reeves said. The next day after
lunch, the student driver once again mentioned
he wasn’t feeling well. “After a break, when we
were back on the road, he began slowing down
as we approached a curve,” Reeves said. “As I
looked over at him, his head suddenly flopped to
the left and he went into seizure-like convulsions
with his hand locked onto the steering wheel.”
Reeves quickly grabbed the wheel. “Thankfully,
when he passed out, his foot relaxed off
DEMETRICE
REEVES
the gas and as the truck slowed, I was able to start pulling the brakes from
the side just enough to continue slowing the truck down,” he said. As the
truck came to a stop, Reeves undid the student driver’s seatbelt, grabbed the
260-pound man, pulled him out of the driver’s seat to the space between the
two front seats, and climbed over him. Once in the driver’s seat, he safely
pulled the truck and trailer off the road. Reeves called 911 and directed emergency
personnel to his location. The student driver was taken to the hospital.
Reeves says after he calmed down from the adrenaline that rushed
through his system that day, he realized just how lucky he and the student
driver were. “He was driving well and I trusted him to drive,” Reeves said.
“But I thought I should keep an eye on him since he hadn’t been feeling well.”
Later, Reeves took an Uber to the hospital to check on the man and take him
his belongings before getting back on the road. Reeves says he was able to
deliver the load to Pompano, unharmed and on time.
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TCA 2019 www.Truckload.org | Truckload Authority 43