Heroes save Wheelchair-bound man from drowning
Published: September 25, 2006
Monty Lerand doesn’t like being labeled a hero. But that’s what fire authorities are calling him and two other Salt Lake City residents who saved a man in a wheelchair from drowning after he fell 10 feet into an irrigation canal and was pinned facedown in the water.
The 46-year-old man, who lives at the Pheasant Hollow care facility near 4000 South and 900 East, was maneuvering his motorized wheelchair down the side of the road around noon Friday when he slid into the canal less than a block from his home, said Unified Fire Authority Capt. Steve Halligan.
Lerand was driving past the canal when he saw the man’s “two feet go over and a wheel,” he said.
Lerand pulled over and flagged down Wanda Porter and Kent Kirkham, who were walking nearby.
The man “just had a frantic look” as he tried to lift his head and breathe through his nose, Kirkham said.
Porter, Kirkham’s fiance, called 911 as Lerand and Kirkham ran into the canal, grabbed the man’s arms and pulled him out of the cold, waist-deep water. He had hit his head on a steel grate and blood was gushing from a cut on his head, Kirkham said.
Because the irrigation canal is not visible from the road, Kirkham believes the man would have died within a minute or so if Lerand had not seen him fall.
Halligan said the man was out getting some fresh air when the accident occurred.
“Without them noticing he had gone in . . . there is no question in my mind this gentleman wouldn’t be with us today,” Halligan said. “I think the three of them are true heros.”
The man, whose name was not released, was taken to University Hospital in serious condition. He was suffering from hypothermia and was having a hard time breathing, Halligan said.
Leland went to the hospital Friday afternoon to visit the man he knew only as Craig. He described his condition as good.
“He opened one eye and squeezed my hand and passed out,” Leland said. “You could tell he knew who I was.”
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