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HIGHWAY ANGELS, FROM PAGE 41
“I thought it was because of the road construction,” he said. “There
was only one open lane.”
Little did he know that a nine-vehicle accident had occurred a mile
ahead involving six trucks and three passenger vehicles. Cole was in for a
long — almost seven hours — wait.
“There was nowhere to go,” he recalled, because concrete barriers
lined both sides of the lane.
A woman who was stopped near Cole was traveling alone with her
10-year-old daughter on their way home to Nebraska.
“I noticed he was such a safe driver on the interstate, truly adhering
to posted speeds and maintaining great distance,” the woman wrote in
a letter to Cole’s employer. “I wanted to compliment him personally, but
didn’t want traffic to restart when I was out of my vehicle. Well, after 80
minutes at a standstill, I figured it was safe.”
She said Cole offered her and her daughter food and water.
“Later, he even gave us a large towel for some privacy when my
daughter had to use a bathroom,” she said. “He was so nice, and generally
reassuring in such a strange predicament. He truly helped myself and my
daughter feel safe on the road. I will continue to speak highly of both him
as a driver and your company. Thank you!”
Cole shared with TCA that the woman was stopped several vehicles
ahead of him.
“She got out first and walked back to my truck,” he recalled. “We started
chatting. Other people were getting out to walk around or walk their
dogs. Some walked up to the scene of the accident and came back to
report what they saw.”
He even offered her bread and sandwich meat that he had in his cab’s
refrigerator.
“I just tried to make the most of it,” he said with a laugh.
There’s so much negativity out here about truck drivers,” said Cole. “If
I see other motorists who are in need of help, I stop and check to see what
I can do.”
Cole has been driving since 2003; before that he worked for the State of
Mississippi after leaving the Navy in 1996.
“I love what I do,” he said. “I wouldn’t do it if I didn’t love it.”
DONNELL HARRIS
Donnell Harris Jr. of Killeen, Texas,
who drives for Artur Express of
Hazelwood, Missouri, is being honored
for stopping to help extinguish
a car fire off Interstate 30.
August 10 was a pretty normal
day for Harris as he drove along I-30
just outside Sulphur Springs, Texas.
That is until he saw billowing smoke
up ahead in the grassy median.
“I thought it was a grass fire,” he
shared with TCA. “But as I got closer,
I saw it was a Ford Mustang on fire.”
DONNELL HARRIS
The flames were coming from
the front of the vehicle and were beginning
to spread to the grass. Harris carefully moved to the left lane of
the two-lane divided highway and pulled over as far as he could onto the
shoulder. Thankfully, the car’s occupants, a mother and young girl, had
escaped safely and waited a safe distance away.
Another motorist had stopped minutes earlier and was using a small
extinguisher, but Harris could see it wasn’t enough to put out the blaze.
“I grabbed my extinguisher and ran to help,” he said.
Harris and the other motorist were able to keep the flames under control
and prevent them from spreading. The fire department arrived on
scene within five minutes and took over. Harris was soon back on his way,
thankful that things turned out as well as they did.
Harris has been driving for six years and will soon celebrate his
one-year anniversary with Artur Express.
ALEC “ZAY” HARRISON
Alec “Zay” Harrison of Portland,
Oregon, who at the time of the incident
drove for Pro Truck Lines of
Portland, Oregon, is being honored
after a last-minute decision put her
in the right place and time to help
resuscitate another driver who had
collapsed at a truck stop.
Harrison was on her way from
Portland to Seattle on a regular route
along Interstate 5 when “nature
called” and put her in the right place
at the right time.
ALEC “ZAY” HARRISON
“I normally stop a little farther up,
but I had to use the rest room,” she
said with a laugh. She pulled into Gee Cee’s Truck Stop at exit 57. “When
I got back in my truck, I decided not to use the front entrance and pulled
around to the back by the mechanic’s shop.”
That’s when she saw two men in the parking lot near a fork lift.
“There was something on the ground,” she shared with TCA. “I thought
they had dropped something, but as I got closer, I realized it was a person
laying there and he wasn’t moving.”
Concerned, Harrison safely pulled over, hit the four ways, and grabbed
her medical kit.
One of the men was calling 911 and the other was kneeling on the
ground, shaking the unresponsive man, a truck driver, who had collapsed
face down.
She checked for a pulse. Finding none, she instructed the two men to
turn the man over while she held his head. She then started doing compressions.
“The paramedics arrived about eight minutes later,” she said. “They
got set up, and then the captain knelt next to me and took over without
missing a beat.”
The paramedics intubated the man and were able to get a pulse, but
then lost it.
“They defibbed him a couple times and got the pulse back and a stable
blood pressure,” shared Harrison. They then got the man ready for transport
to the hospital.
“I got back in my truck and pulled out to continue on,” she said.
“But I was shaking so bad I had to pull over,” she shared. “I called my
sister who is a nurse, and my buddy, Joe. Later that afternoon as I was
heading back to Portland, Joe found the hospital where the man had been
taken to. He was told the man was a patient, so that was good. It meant
he was still alive.”
The next morning Harrison got a call from one of the driver’s co-workers
who had picked up his load. He wasn’t doing well, but his family, including
his wife and daughter, were at the hospital with him.
Later that afternoon Harrison learned the driver had passed away.
“At least his family could be there,” she said with a catch in her
throat. “I found out his co-worker had delivered his load at 4 p.m.
The man passed away at 4:15. (The co-worker) was choked up and
44 TRUCKLOAD AUTHORITY | WWW.TRUCKLOAD.ORG TCA JANUARY/FEBRUARY 2022