Have you saved a life?

[Shmerlin]

This probably dosen't county, but I'm one of the people who answer 911 calls and sends the Police/Fire/EMS to you.

[basmith42]

This probably dosen't county, but I'm one of the people who answer 911 calls and sends the Police/Fire/EMS to you.

I think it counts.
You do good work that many of us could not do. Don't discount it.

[Shmerlin]

This probably dosen't county, but I'm one of the people who answer 911 calls and sends the Police/Fire/EMS to you.

I think it counts.
You do good work that many of us could not do. Don't discount it.

Well, its one of those, we know it counts but its not a direct effect kind of thing.

Dispatch tends to be a bit forgotten in the grand scheme of things, unless we screw up that is LOL.

[riverjoe47]

I would think it would really count if you"re good at your job .
Not one of those " help this is Mrs Smith at 101 Elm St. there's a man in my house " " Ok maam calm down how do you spell Smith ?"

[olbaid_dratsab]

As lead vehical team leader, I spotted a 55lb EFP.

[nasonguy]

One of my sisters, 2 1/2 years old, decided she would like to play with the marbles that we kept in a shoe box on a shelf. She got herself a chair, and got her marbles. She was in another room, so I didn't see this. But aparently, she decided to see how many she could stuff in her mouth.

I was about 16 when this happened.

Me and mom are eating lunch, and we notice that it's gotten quiet in the living room. Two seconds later, little footsteps in the hallway, I look around the corner and see her half stumbling, looking scared, white, mouth open, arms up and out as if she wants to be picked up. I go over and bend her over, finger swipe a couple marbles out, gravity does the rest, she chokes super loud, takes in one super deep shakey breath, and then proceeds to break in to the loudest, most scared sounding cry I have ever heard in my life. But that was OK, crying was a good thing right then, much less scary that the dead silence.

Also, been with one particular friend right after she has tried to take her life, calmed her down, called 911, etc. She has realised how foolish and selfish taking her own life would be and has also cleaned up her act significantly. I'm still good friends with her, very close friends actually, saving her life was worth it.

[john917v]

Nason, good point. Now, she may go on to save a life, and so on. And, you kept a friend, always good

[KnifeStyle]

Like others, I can respond yes. And I'm leaving it at that. Can't say I get too proud looking back, I just end up sighing a lot and usually waste the good mood I'd been in. Then I go train and prepare more. This is just how it goes.

[MrMendigo]

This probably dosen't county, but I'm one of the people who answer 911 calls and sends the Police/Fire/EMS to you.

This counts...IMO anybody that faces death daily, as a profession, saves lives. Thanks to you all for what you do...

[drewder]

Saved my 9 year old nephew in 2008 on his birthday. He won a ball at Chuck E Cheese and was bouncing it in the parking lot. A car was coming just as he bounced it and it flew forward. He jumped out into the path of the oncoming car and I grabbed him by the hood of his jacket and yanked his ass out of the path. He cried because he lost his little rubber bouncing ball (mind you, he just got a sh!tload of transformers, legos and other stuff for his birthday, but that damned ball was all that mattered.... reason 479 why I don't think I will have kids). I don't think the car was going fast enough to do much damage, but if he got ran over, he wouldn't have been happy.

Spring of 1999 I went to visit my mom and borrow her 95 Blazer for Prom. On my way back home, I was driving up the highway and maybe 200-300 yards away, I saw what looked like a giant blue trashbag blowing up the highway. When I got closer, I realized it was another Chevy Blazer that started rolling up the highway. I pulled over not far from where the car parts started coming off and a semi next to me did the same, but he blocked both lanes on the highway. We got out and ran to the wrecked Blazer only to find a woman screaming at the top of her lungs. When she stopped to take a breathe, we heard a baby in back screaming. The trucker and I went to the back and the baby was safe, sitting in it's car seat, had a few bits of broken glass on it, but nothing really bad. The trucker pried the door open and I pulled the baby out. In that time, thick smoke started coming from under the hood. I ran the baby back to the Blazer I was driving, where people started gathering. I had an elderly couple attend to the baby while I ran back up and the trucker was trying to get the woman out. When I got back, the hood was covered in flames and I couldn't figure out why the woman couldn't just get out or climb out. I then realized when we got her crumpled door open, and pulled her out, that her neck was broken about the C5 or C6. You could physically see the mis-alignment. The trucker and I supported her the best we could. By the we got her away from the scene and started assessing the damages, the whole front of the Blazer was in flames. Rescue Crews and Fire Trucks showed up. Her mangled bloody hand was wrapped in parts of my shirt. The trucker used part of his shirt to wrap her head because she sustained a few cuts and also ripped out parts of her hair while rolling. I never found out if she survived or not, but I do know the baby did. Needless to say, I didn't drive my mom's Blazer that night. I just took my beat ass van to Prom.

I don't know if you can say "I" really saved this guy's life, but you sure as sh!t can say the Zombie Squad ZSC001 saved 2 lives at Wintergheddon 2010.
viewtopic.php?f=56&t=57663

I have also had my life saved a few times. Here is to the life savers of the world (tip your hat or do your shot... or both at the same time).

[nasonguy]

Spring of 1999 I went to visit my mom and borrow her 95 Blazer for Prom. On my way back home, I was driving up the highway and maybe 200-300 yards away, I saw what looked like a giant blue trashbag blowing up the highway. When I got closer, I realized it was another Chevy Blazer that started rolling up the highway. I pulled over not far from where the car parts started coming off and a semi next to me did the same, but he blocked both lanes on the highway. We got out and ran to the wrecked Blazer only to find a woman screaming at the top of her lungs. When she stopped to take a breathe, we heard a baby in back screaming. The trucker and I went to the back and the baby was safe, sitting in it's car seat, had a few bits of broken glass on it, but nothing really bad. The trucker pried the door open and I pulled the baby out. In that time, thick smoke started coming from under the hood. I ran the baby back to the Blazer I was driving, where people started gathering. I had an elderly couple attend to the baby while I ran back up and the trucker was trying to get the woman out. When I got back, the hood was covered in flames and I couldn't figure out why the woman couldn't just get out or climb out. I then realized when we got her crumpled door open, and pulled her out, that her neck was broken about the C5 or C6. You could physically see the mis-alignment. The trucker and I supported her the best we could. By the we got her away from the scene and started assessing the damages, the whole front of the Blazer was in flames. Rescue Crews and Fire Trucks showed up. Her mangled bloody hand was wrapped in parts of my shirt. The trucker used part of his shirt to wrap her head because she sustained a few cuts and also ripped out parts of her hair while rolling. I never found out if she survived or not, but I do know the baby did. Needless to say, I didn't drive my mom's Blazer that night. I just took my beat ass van to Prom.

Car wrecks are scary man. I recently got in a particularly nasty wreck (head on, 3 involved vehicles). I was struck head on by a civic that had been rear ended by a jeep. I was driving a Saturn SC2. It was ugly. The saturn did a superb job keeping me safe thankfully. But anyways, immediately after, I was a little dazed, kinda disoriented, and had one ragin' mother-lovin' head ache. As soon as I took a second to breath and gather my wits, I looked around outside my crumpled saturn and noticed a child on the side of the road, crying, bleeding from the head, and a shookup older sibling. It felt like my heart turned in to a cold slab of meat and my guts just froze. Boy, that got me moving quick, took my seat belt off, tried my door, nope, went out the window, ran over there to make sure he was ok. Thankfully he was, just a minor laceration on his head by his right eye, but that was it. After I made certain to myself that he was OK, and checked on other people involved, I finally checked on my hand that was aching a little bit. I looked down and saw windshield glass all up in it, bleeding profusely, deep cuts, but I could move all of my fingers (phew).

My point is, something about knowing that a child is involved and possibly hurt (bad) just hits us on an subconcious, instinctual level to where we are motivated in to action regardless of the surrounding situation, sometimes at our own peril. It was only after I helped the child that I felt the adrenalin hit, and noticed that I had ran across a very chaotic intersection without hardly looking. I didn't care, that child was the foremost thing on my mind. I think anyone who has been in a similar situation can agree with me and knows exactly what feeling I am talking about, you know, feeling your heart literally skip a beat. I know parents get this feeling too, haha.

[brer]

Directly? Probably not. Indirectly? More than likely.

I used to work as a controls mechanic at a pretty large complex. Lots of industrial processes and little training.

If you have ever worked on an assembly line, you have probably seen guys like me. We're the guys that are always going up and down the line inspecting the equipment and repairing it as it breaks.

Because an assembly line works the way it does, ie if one part of the line stops, the whole line will shortly stop, supervisors will do anything to get it working again. The supervisors first job is production, his second job is safety. A few hundred people sitting around doing nothing is pretty expensive.

Mechanics and electronics/electrical guys do not generally work directly under assembly line supervisors for a reason. Odds are the supervisor is just a senior assembly line hand with little training beyond getting product out.

I have in the past, kept people from being parboiled, deep fried, crushed, blinded, irradiated, electrocuted, blinded, blown up, or maimed in various horrific ways. I think we are still on OSHA's top 40 list.

I carried locks in my bag and special keys that allowed me to lock out power to whole buildings or complexes. I have used them more than once when in my opinion, an unsafe operation was going on.

I quit my job not too long ago because I am certain that my former employer will kill someone soon due to a lack of regard for safety. I will not ever stand up in front of a jury while trying to explain how a foreseeable death was not foreseeable if I can help it.

Have I saved lives? Probably. Was it glamorous? No. For some reason, the accidents that don't happen do not get people's attention.

Me, I like the accidents that don't happen.

[thesupremeking]

swerved out of the way of an oncoming camaro taking a bend too fast only to see it hit the bmw behind me head on. I got out and ran to the BMW, 2 little girls in the back seat stunned and an unconscious father in the front. Car caught on fire under the hood so I unbuckled the girls and ran across the street with them and sat them next to a tree. I told them not to move because I needed to get their dad out. Ran back over and unbuckled their dad, thankfully a trucker pulled up and had a small extinguisher to knock the fire back a bit and helped me free the guy from the front seat. It was tough because he was mumbling nonsense and his legs were jammed in there pretty hard. Normally I would've left him until the medics showed up but we didn't have much choice. The dad became pretty conscious at this point and could talk normal and it was obvious his leg(s) were broken but seemed otherwise fine, he was asking about his girls and what happened. We plopped him by the tree with his girls. At this time me and the trucker dude ran over to the camaro as the driver was rolling out of the window. It was obvious when he tried to walk something wasn't quite right with him, he was stumbling like a (pun intended) zombie or a robot loosing power, kind of jerky twitching movements. I made him lay still on the ground and he was flailing and trying to talk but I couldn't understand him. He had no shirt on and the asphalt was hot so he was squirmy but I was scared to move him. He tried talking a few more times then stopped and died before medics showed up. His buddy in the passenger seat was fine.

I don't know if I saved a life or what would've happened, all I know is I did what I could when I had to.

[velojym]

Once, not counting all the wrecks I've avoided.

[Crex39]

My neighbor was going to go to the strip club with last of his wife's baby shower money on the night their baby was born, I talked him into going to the hospital instead. Does that count?

[Resolute]

Most recently six days ago, coded a guy for 40 minutes - nice family, but didn't get him back. Fail.

Four days ago, coded a guy for 25 minutes, and he's going in the right direction now - still alive.

Working in an ICU makes this a little more commonplace. I definitely don't feel like a hero when we keep people from dying, and I find it really hard to take praise from family for "saving" the patient. Still, I love my job and wouldn't want to leave it - part of why I drive 100 miles each way 3 days a week for it.

[jermzy]

I saved a grossly overweight woman on my trip to Bermuda who swam out to far. She clung on to me and almost drowned me in return. I threatened to let her drown if she didn't hold still. I held onto to her for the longest 20 minutes of my life trying to get someone to notice. Eventually a life guard on a jet skit spotted us and came and took her back to land. She left the deepest scratches on my back that also needed medical attention.

[Valarius]

When I was much younger, I intervened when a small gang was beating a kid with rocks & a muffler pipe. Not sure if they were going to kill him, but as it was he needed 30 stitches on the scalp & had a decent concussion.

When I was 16, I got shoved down from behind and my head repeatedly slammed into the sidewalk. I owe my life to two friends.


When I was in third grade--in Hawai`i, of all places--I was dropped off by the school bus on my street, and a little eight year old kid was dropped off on the next street down. I started walking home, then heard him scream, and came over to find someone's Doberman growling at him. I threw some rocks, scared the dog away, and escorted the kid home.

Looking over what I just wrote, there's really no way to recount these stories without sounding like an attention whore, is there?

[SouthPAW]

Wow, this totally reminded me of something that happened a few years ago.

I was out partying with my old roommate on his birthday, and he got super wasted. We ended up back at his cousins place, and were out on the balcony.

He was so wasted, he lost his balance, and started falling down. He grabbed the railing, but started to go over! The railing was only a few feet high, about waist height for us. Luckily, I a fair amount bigger than him. He was probably about 160 lbs, and I was probably about 200 lbs at the time. I'm also reasonably strong for my size, have a strong grip from doing judo (especially when grabbing clothes! ) and I wasn't wasted either.

I literally reached out, grabbed a handful of his jeans, and yelled for his cousin (who is way bigger than me even) to come help me pull him up.

We were 4 floors up, and below was bricks and cement. Would have been splat. Ouch. Game over.

The whole thing gave me a weird feeling. I had a hard time falling asleep that night. I downloaded and played Elton Johns "Someone saved my life tonight" when I got home. I don't know why. That lyric got stuck in my head and the fact I couldn't remember the rest of the song drove me nuts.

He never properly thanked me. That always annoyed me. We never talk about it either. Like it never happened.

[Kn'a'ckeH'a'xan]

Saved a kid from drowning years ago.

I was only 13 at the time (+/- 1 year) and he was maybe 5 years old. It was at a waterpark. He dived into a pool 5 foot deep and didn't reappear. His mother was 20 yards away on a bench in the shadows, reading or polishing her nails or something else useful at that time.

Merely got a "thank you" from her.

[Thunderman]

Hey all, just joined today and came across this thread and figured I'd post 1 of my experiences. I guess this is a good of a first post as any!

A few years ago when I was doing a bunch of rock climbing and rappelling my climbing partner and I decided to introduce the sport to our girlfriends since we were going 4 to 5 times a month to various places around the state and even a few over the road trips to farther locals. Living in Kentucky there are some great rock climbing locations what with Daniel Boone National Forest and Red River Gorge. We decided to take them rappelling first so they could get used to being on a rope before we complicated it later when they'd also have to start climbing. I've always enjoyed a high speed rappelling so we were looking forward to some fun with them. Being it was a very nice day we went pretty deep in the woods (1 and 1/4 mile to be exact) to a great natural bridge with a great 80 foot drop and there were quite a few people laying out ropes when we got there.

I've ALWAYS been a stickler for safety (from my years as a volunteer firefighter and taking high ropes rescue courses, etc) and so we started with the safety of the harnesses, importance of repetition, gloves, ropes, knots, etc. As we were setting up I noted a younger guy (found out later he was 18 while I was 23) who was unrolling his brand new rope from the spool who didn't seem to have a grasp on anything he was doing in comparison to all the other rockers that day. Fast forward about an hour or so and at least 4 trips "escorting" the ladies down the ropes. They were having a blast after their initial fear of sitting back off the ledge. They would go butt first and my climbing partner and I would go Australian (face first) and would belay them by running their rope to our harness. If something went bad or they got out of control all we had to do was pull their rope to stop them. When we got to the bottom each time, there was a 70ish foot "climb" back to the top and after an hours worth of somewhat slow decents, Jake (climbing partner) and I decided we'd do a jump together and "rap jump" - you pull 15 to 20 feet of rope thru your speed-8 on the back of your harness (again face first) so that you have a bit of free fall when you take off running and leap off the ledge. We would often race to the bottom and boy you talk about a rush! We made it down the 80 feet in a few seconds and our adrenaline was pumping. Two people came up to us while we were unhooking our ropes and we were all laughing, etc when all of a sudden we hear someone scream from the top of the wall. Looking up we see it's the young novice from earlier and he's falling backwards off the ledge. In a second I started moving towards the rope I thought he was on in an attempt to belay him but it shot away from me due to the rate he was falling. I looked up to see him coming and without any conscious thought that I can recall, I leaped towards him and hit him - hard. He was falling with his head at the 7 position and his feet in the air and I hit him in his lower back at his belt line. The weight of him on me, sat me right down and I was able to deflect him off of me and we both hit the rocky ground with a horrid "thud". People started coming over the wall expecting to see this kid splattered on the ground, but instead saw us crumpled together. My climbing partner Jake said he turned to his right to say "Holy sh*t! Did you see that?!" before he realized it was actually me that hit the kid and was laying on the ground. At this point the kid was screaming and it seemed to us he was hurt pretty badly (turns out he wasn't - severe rope burns to his hands and mild sprain to his back where I hit him) - his hands were bloody and burned since he forgot his gloves. I stood up as quickly as I could thinking I'd only knocked the wind out of myself...boy was I wrong. As I stepped to help the boy it was then that I started to realize things weren't right. I looked down and the shoulder that I hit him with was a good 3 inches down (shattered clavicle, broken scapula) and I was having trouble taking a deep breath (all left side ribs broken) and my right leg wasn't working correctly (fractured hip) - I was also feeling a dull pain in my core behind my belly button (two fractured vertebra where I "sat" on my heel on impact). As people started attending to Gabe (as we'd later find out was his name), it was few moments before I had to call some attention to myself. As it turns out two of the people helping and myself were the most advanced trained in first aid so while those two helped Gabe, I kind of had to lead my own "rescue" if-you-will. I had them help me cut up some runners and other climbing equipment to stabilize my arm to my core and after sitting down for only a few moments announced we were getting the hell out of there. So as not to make a long post longer, with help I ended up climbing back up the 65 foot scramble to the top and we walked out a mile and a quarter to the awaiting ambulance (i did make a point to have all my gear bagged up and out of everything only left a caribiner and my sunglasses). Half way out we ran into the rescue squad that had been summoned and I waved them on - I'd come this far and we truly believed Gabe to be in MUCH worse shape than me. Hell - he'd just fallen 80ish feet. When we got to the parking lot where the ambulance was there was a country Sheriff waiting to do the report and after my account with info peppered in from my "escorts" - he was the first to say "Well son, I'm sure you saved that boys life....". It was only then that even dawned on me. About 20 minutes later they wheeled him out on a rescue stretcher and he said to me as he was being loaded up "Thanks for saving my life". When they had him in they went to help me in and I refused - I knew I had some serious things going on and I didn't want to go to the backwoods hospital they were taking him to. Much to their chagrin I signed a release, they gave me two more ice packs (I had a series of strains and sprains starting at my neck going all the way to my buttocks) and a smelling salts and my girlfriend (now wife) drove me almost 2 hours to a Lexington trauma center with Jake and his girlfriend in tow. After sitting down in the passenger seat of the car as we left, that was the last time I walked unaided for almost 3 months. AFter rounds and rounds of surgery to rebuild my shoulder and lots of baby-steps in recovery I'm back to what I'd say is 100%. I was given 3 citations and medals (Carnegie Hero award and grant, Kentucky State and Jefferson County medal's of valor). There's a lot more to this story but again - this is an insanely long post as it is.

[nasonguy]

Cool story bro. Don't know if I would have risked my own life to break his fall. That kinda of mass, moving that fast, could have easily killed you DRT.

I'm gunna be the first to let you know, but everyone and their mother is going to doubt the authenticity of your story unless you like, get pics and stuff. It's just the way the internet is, no offence meant.

ETA: Might want to start a whole thread yourself, just for this story, this subforum (personal experiences) is perfect. Some other guy a while back made one of his first posts a nice long story about how he got attacked my mountain lions, killed one, and scared off the rest. Helluva introduction if you ask me. Sounds like your story has the same potential... Just sayin...

[Thunderman]

I'm gunna be the first to let you know, but everyone and their mother is going to doubt the authenticity of your story unless you like, get pics and stuff. It's just the way the internet is, no offence meant.

ETA: Might want to start a whole thread yourself, just for this story, this subforum (personal experiences) is perfect. Some other guy a while back made one of his first posts a nice long story about how he got attacked my mountain lions, killed one, and scared off the rest. Helluva introduction if you ask me. Sounds like your story has the same potential... Just sayin...

Completely understand, and you're right, it's the just the way of the internets!

I'll find find a link to add to one of the citations from the Carnegie Hero Fund. I think that's the only one online.

[oldsoldier]

I have donated blood, am a marrow donor, and an organ donor. That sorta makes me a lifesaver-in-waiting, right?
Kudos to all of you that have. Even the ones you dont think are worth it, a life is a life. Good or bad, you did your job. Sometimes, we just gotta put our personal feelings aside, and do the task at hand. Karma can be a bitch. Dont piss her off