|
Training Exercise Saves 2-year-old
July 1999
It's taken for granted that SAR training may be interrupted by the real thing. It happened again at a radio class on Sunday, July 25, 1999.
Near the end of the class, as SAR members were doing a field exercise near the SAR Lodge, they spotted a crying two-year old boy wandering alone on Pony Express Trail, Cedar Grove's main street. The child was in the traffic lanes, yet partially hidden by a curve in the road. The team quickly scooped him out of the highway.
The boy said his name was Eduardo, but he couldn't tell them where he lived, and none of the nearby neighbors recognized him. Finally, the team found some local children who said they knew where his house was. While a couple of SAR members waited at the scene in case the parents came looking, the rest followed the children a few blocks to boy's home.
The mother, who was working in the yard, had no idea that the boy was missing until the SAR team showed up with him. After she was reunited with her son, she said that perhaps the boy had tried to follow his father when he left for work.
Later, the SAR members said that had they not snatched Eduardo out of the road, "his life expectancy was pretty short."
Credit for extending little Eduardo's life span goes to Linda Colombo, Cathy Dickerson, Missi Escobar, Earl Hoffman, Diane Palmer, Pam Richer, and Wanda Myers. |