BATON ROUGE, La. — Two paramedics saved a man who jumped from a bridge 130 feet above the Mississippi River.
East Baton Rouge Parish EMS paramedics Michael Castello and Jarrod Love responded to a call about a possible suicide, The Advocate reported.
When they arrived at the scene, they found the man clinging to the bridge’s railing and hanging from the side of the bridge.
The medics slowly approached him and tried talking to him.
“What’s your name?” Castello asked.
“Gone,” the man replied.
“Gone what?” Costello said.
“Gone to meet my maker,” replied the man as he let go, dropping from the bridge.
Costello and Love lunged after him. They grabbed him by an arm and by his belt and managed to pull him back up.
The medics wrestled the man onto the bridge’s roadway and held him down with the help of a passing motorist who stopped to assist.
With ‘seconds’ to act, BR paramedics grab suicidal man, pull him to safety on I-10 bridge: https://t.co/h132NxlDnz pic.twitter.com/Wt3BIpc8zR
— The Advocate (@theadvocatebr) October 21, 2015
Soon after, police arrived and officers restrained the man, who was then transported to the hospital for evaluation.
Costello and Love said they didn’t think about reaching for the man or wrestle him back over the railing. They didn’t worry about getting pulled over with him; they just acted.
“It’s one of those things you don’t really think about; you just do it,” Castello said. “I don’t think we’d be able to live with ourselves if we’d just watched him go.”