Trust
instinct to the end...even though you can give no reason.
(Ralph
Waldo Emerson)
Millions of species communicate using body language and instinctive
'calls' to another. Humans have instinctive calls too ~ our distress
scream, laughter and crying. All humans and animals are deeply
intertwined. Several animals contribute to the survival of other
species, including humans. Often overlooked, they pollinate crops to
cleaning of oceans...so many roles animals play in preserving the
existence of the human species and the planet.
Soccer
Player Makes Life-Saving Play on Hamilton Field
Joe Sterrazza was supposed to be driving a Hamilton Street Railway
bus on the night he almost died of a heart attack. But his shift was
called off, so the West Hamilton dad headed to his weekly soccer game
with friends at Mountain Sports Complex. On the way, he picked up
Bruno Bombardieri, who was also supposed to miss the game on January
23, 2013, but changed his plans at the last minute.
Halfway through the game, Sterrazza, a fit 40-year old, collapsed on
the field with no warning. He had no vital signs after collapse.
Bombardieri immediately came to his rescue, performing CPR for an
agonizing 12 minutes until paramedics arrived with an automatic
external defibrillator.
“You
have a very good friend,” Sterrazza remembers a doctor saying
after he was saved. She told me straight out, 'if he wasn't there,
you wouldn't be here!'
He tells his story now to illustrate the importance of a national
foundation bringing its CPR and defillibrator training program to
Halton's 28 high schools in the Public, Catholic and French boards.
Other players felt so helpless that one organized a CPR training
session so they'd never be caught not knowing what to do in a
life-and-death situation again.
Joe stated, “I had no signs and I never felt anything.
I
was playing soccer and I made a pass and then I woke up at Juravinski
Hospital.”
Man
Who Saved Girl from Fire: “I'm Not a Hero!”
Posted in the Toronto Sun February 14, 2017... Jack Boland from
Brampton reported...”Sheldon Teague
doesn't
want to be known as a hero after valiantly rescuing a young girl from
a house fire that claimed the lives of her mother, father and sister.
'Im
just a regular person who did what needed to be done in the moment,'
the 19-year-old said.
Staying with a friend and her dad, watching a movie, they smelled
smoke and saw it coming out of the vents around 3:30 a.m. in a
neighbouring home.
“Stepping
outside, I could see fire coming out of the upper bedroom.”
He ran around to the front of the house, yelling for help...and
started to kick in the door only to be met by a wall of flames. He
then heard screaming coming from inside. Armed with only a
flashlight, he quickly searched, yelling for somebody to come toward
his voice. She made it about halfway down the hallway, at which point
he spotted her legs under the heavy smoke.
“So
then I ran towards her..picked her up and brought her outside.”
The
girl is now at Sick Kids Hospital recovering from 3rd
degree burns.
Her family, sadly did not survive.
Teague
said he was 'simply
doing what he could do to help.
He remained until Brampton Fire crews arrived to battle the blaze.
“It
was horrifying. I'm not sure how many voices I could hear.”
Ump
Saves Woman on Bridge's Edge
As a Major League Baseball umpire, John Tumpane often has to defuse
tense situations at the ballpark.
“None
compared to the scene he came upon Wednesday as he walked across the
Roberto Clemente Bridge in Pittsburgh around 3 p.m. on his way back
from a run and lunch” reported Stephen J. Nesbitt.
A
few hundred yards from PNC Park, he saw a woman climb over a railing
and look down toward the Allegheny river below. “Obviously, that
grabbed my attention,” Tupane said prior to the Pirates game
against the Tampa Bay Rays, in which the 34-year-old Chicago native
was the home-plate umpire. The bridge was mostly empty at that time
of day. Tumpane rushed toward the woman, who appeared calm and
asking what was going on. “I just wanted to get a better look of
the city from this side,” she replied. “Oh,
no,”
Tumpane said, hooking his arm around hers. “You
don't want to do that. It's just as good over here. Let's grab some
lunch and talk.”
“No,no,
no,” she answered. “I'm better off on this side...just let me
go!” He said, “I'm
not going to let you go. Let' talk this out. We'll get you back
over here.”
She replied, “No one wants to help me,” she repeated. “Just
let me go!” “No,
we're here to help you.”
“You'll forget me tomorrow.” “I'll
never forget you,”
he said. “You
can have my promise on that.”
Tumpane mouthed to a passerby, “Call 911.”
As
they spoke, the woman became more emotional. “She cried and tried
to slip from my grip. I locked both my arms around her back. At
times, she dangled both feet off the bridge's edge, putting her full
weight in my arms. I was thinking, God,
this has got to be a good ending, not a bad ending...and
held on for dear life. She said, “I
just want to end it right now. I want to be in a better place.”
One man helped grab the woman's arms...and another pinned her ankles
against the bottom rail. Soon, a police boat arrived, then a
helicopter, an ambulance, a fire truck and a police officer. They
put a life preserver on the woman and handcuffed one of her wrists
to the bridge. “I advised her, Look, all these people are here who
want to help you for the right reasons. We want to get you better.”
Before she was whisked away, Tumpane knelt next to the woman and
tried to comfort her.
He asked for her first name and she gave it to him....and he prayed
for her.
John
Tupane hopes to reconnect with her at the hospital
before he leaves Pittsburgh for his next series in another major
city.
In
the end, Tumpane said, “It was a matter of right
place and right time.”
Human
Chain Rescues
Only
a few weeks ago, families and children were in danger of drowning in
a sudden powerful riptide in the Gulf of Mexico near Panama City
Beach in Florida. Due to extreme dangerous waters, at least 80 people
formed a human
chain
to rescue a stranded group caught in the riptide.
(Reading
this news item, I recalled when Roger and Deanne Woodward
were swept toward Niagara Falls' precipices when a family friend's
boat overturned up-river).
The children wore the only 2 life-jackets on board.
Roger, only 7 years old in 1960, now says, “This water looks like
it's as big as a house with waves and rocks...one minute you're
pulled underwater...you can't breathe and wonder if you'll breath
again. Then,
you're thrown off rocks as you're going through the rapids.”
MIRACLE, it was when the blond, blue-eyed boy was pulled onto the
Maid of the Mist tour boat after his plunge over the Horseshoe Falls.
Deanne, then 17 was rescued just before the brink: Two New Jersey
tourists, John Hayes and John Quattrochi (one whom I recall was
black) one holding the protection railing, the other stepping into
the raging water, extended his hand which she was able to grasp...as
the two men pulled her to safety.
I
invite you to read
Part 2 ~ Animals Rescuing People
in next posting.
Compiled by Merle Baird-Kerr...August 13, 2017
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