Sarah Sarder
The Dallas Morning News
Emergency medics in Fort Worth rescued two fortunate individuals Wednesday night after the medics spotted a car in flames and found two unconscious adults inside.
“If it was not for the MedStar crew’s valiant efforts, the patients on [sic] would not have been given a chance to survive and would have likely burned alive in the car,” MedStar spokesman Matt Zavadsky said in an email.
Miguel Brito and Ryan Bader, both crew members with MedStar Mobile Healthcare, were passing the Interstate 35W northbound ramp to Interstate 20 eastbound ramp at about 9:30 p.m. in their ambulance. They were on their way to a designated location to await emergency calls, Zavadsky said.
Just before the ambulance drove by, a small sedan crashed into another vehicle where the ramps merged onto the highway, forcing traffic to the far left lane.
The sedan was engulfed in flames when Brito and Bader happened onto the scene. The two immediately took the fire extinguisher from the ambulance and suppressed the flames enough to begin extricating the people in the car.
The pair observed two unconscious adults and quickly began to remove one from the car, Zavadsky said. They noticed that one vehicle was leaking fluids.
The medics dragged the first person out and away from the scene, leaving him next to the ambulance. All of the rescue efforts were manual because without the fire department on the scene, the medics had no extrication tools.
The second adult was pinned under the car’s dash. One medic suffered minor cuts and a back injury while getting the person out of the vehicle.
The pair called for backup and began giving “lifesaving care” to both adults, Zavadsky said.
Emergency services later transported the two freed patients, who were in critical condition, and a third patient with minor injuries to an area trauma center.
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