Teen rescues baby after car crash
Published: September 21, 2006
A TEENAGER has rescued a baby from the wreckage of a smashed car before trying to comfort the boy’s dying mother, telling her that her child was safe.
“I kept telling her that her kid was all right and kept asking her to talk to me so I knew that she would stay with me, and then the ambulance people came,” Matt Vongsykeo, 14, said today.
The four-month old baby boy, found hanging in his capsule when Mr Vongsykeo crawled into the smashed car in Melbourne’s Springvale, escaped serious injury and was taken to hospital for observation.
But the child’s 33-year-old mother, from Endeavour Hills, died in hospital following last night’s high speed crash, which left three other people injured.
A car on the wrong side of the road is thought to have been travelling at well over 100 kph when it hit three other vehicles, police said.
Mr Vongsykeo said he heard the crash from his house and found a Holden Jackaroo propped against a brick wall.
He heard a baby crying.
“There were two grown men standing outside the car and they couldn’t get in, so they held up the boot and I had to crawl in and get the baby out,” he said.
“I had to do it quickly because there was a window below me and I was afraid that was going to break.”
Mr Vongsykeo told how he scooped the baby in his arms and called to see if there was anyone else in the car.
He found the baby’s mother unconscious.
“I thought she was dead so I just freaked out,” he said.
“She entered consciousness later on and I went around and started talking to her and getting her to talk to me and stay with me.”
He said he comforted the mother and told her her baby was safe.
“They took her away and I thought she was going to be fine,” he said.
Mr Vongsykeo dismissed suggestions he was a hero.
“I’ve lived 14 years, if something had happened to me … I’ve lived 14 years. That baby hasn’t and I wanted to give that baby a chance,” he said on Southern Cross radio.
The speeding Holden Commodore had first sideswiped a Toyota Camry before hitting the woman’s Jackaroo and crashing into a Honda Civic.
Police said it was a “massive collision” that caused tremendous damage.
The Commodore driver, a man aged about 40, was thrown clear following the second collision and was in a critical condition at The Alfred hospital.
Police are investigating why he was on the wrong side of the road.
A woman in her early 20s suffered serious back and chest injuries and was also taken to The Alfred hospital.
Another woman was sent to the Monash Medical Centre with minor injuries.
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