Someone was there to hold the hand of a Beaufort County woman hit by and stuck under a car in downtown Beaufort on Monday morning until she was rescued and on her way to the hospital.
The man told firefighters the crash happened at about 10:31 a.m. — he knew because he was standing nearby and looking down to send a text message when he heard the crash — Beaufort-Port Royal Fire Department Capt. John Robinson said on Tuesday afternoon.
Robinson didn’t get the man’s name, but he told Robinson he went over, took the woman’s hand and prayed with her while help was on the way.
The emergency call was made at about 10:35 a.m. Emergency workers rushed over to Charles and Craven streets and had her free in 6 minutes, Robinson said. The 42-year-old woman was fully under the car, pinned down by the 3,500- to 4,000-pound Mercedes for 10 minutes and was then taken to Beaufort Memorial Hospital by Beaufort County EMS.
Robinson couldn’t give specifics of the level of her injuries but indicated they were certainly not trivial.
“You can imagine the injuries that would be associated with that kind of accident,” he said.
When someone is trapped underneath a car, rescue is not as simple and picking up the vehicle and moving it over, Robinson explained. That strategy would be both difficult and unstable. Instead, Beaufort firefighters with help from Burton Fire District used a system of air bags to lift the car — which look more like boxes than bags — and cribbing blocks to keep it steady and ensure that even if the air bags failed, the car wouldn’t come back down on the patient, causing even more damage, he said.
Some of the air bags firefighters used on Monday could support up to 21 tons and lift a car up by 12 inches. In total, the car was lifted about 20 inches with stacked air bags (a common practice that is in line with the way the equipment is designed, Robinson said) in order to safely get the victim out from under the car on Monday.
“Without the right equipment to manage that (situation), you could potentially do more harm,” the captain said.
The firefighters in the department are specifically trained to use this and other equipment and techniques that could save someone’s life. In addition to the set of air bags and cribbing blocks that were on Ladder 2 on Monday, the department will soon be adding a matching set to its new Station 4 on Robert Smalls Parkway, Robinson said.
“I think our responders on duty did an excellent job and did exactly what they were supposed to do,” the captain said. He also praised Burton Fire District and Beaufort County EMS personnel for their work on Monday.
On Monday, the Beaufort Police Department said the 75-year-old Beaufort County woman who was driving the car received a traffic citation for failing to yield to a pedestrian, but that no criminal charges were pending.
The police department would not release the name of the pedestrian Tuesday afternoon, and there was no update available on her condition.
A representative of Beaufort Memorial Hospital could not immediately be reached for comment Tuesday afternoon.
Joan McDonough: 843-706-8125, @IPBG_Joan
This story was originally published January 23, 2018 4:39 PM.