La Plata, MD – In a press conference Thursday, Sept. 8, Officers from the Charles County Sheriff’s Office recounted dramatic events from a single-vehicle crash on St. Charles Parkway Sept. 2 where occupants were trapped inside a burning car.
According to police reports, a Chevrolet Aveo left the roadway for unknown reasons and crashed into a tree line off the roadway.
Charles County Sheriff’s Office Cpl. William “Brad” Saunders was the first to arrive on the scene and found the engine of the car fully engulfed in flames.
Saunders said when confronted with such trauma, training kicks in.
“You rely on your training,” Saunders noted. “You don’t think, you just act.”
With the fire spreading closer to the victims, they had to stem the flames,
Officers could be seen in video from a cruiser running back to their cruisers for agency-issued fire extinguishers.
“We had to work with what we had,” Saunders said. “The only thing we could do was do what we could. We were trying to keep the fire out of there.”
Officer Justin Bottorf dragged the male driver of the vehicle away from the burning car while his fellow officers battled the blaze.
The victim had suffered a broken leg.
“You don’t think about how dangerous it is,” Bottorf explained. “I know if it was me, I would want a police officer to do the same thing for me.”
Officer Matthew Nauman said, “Our focus was to the get the fire extinguished and to get them out.”
Training proved immensely helpful, he added.
“It helped a lot,” he noted.
“I was really just reacting,” Officer Lamar Hamilton pointed out.
Hamilton was the officer credited with extricating the two young children from the burning car.
When emergency units from Waldorf, Hughesville, Brandywine and La Plata began arriving, they extinguished the fire and began extricating the female adult.
Officers also discovered a 19-year-old victim who had been thrown from the vehicle during the crash who had been dragged to safety by three unknown Good Samaritans.
Sheriff’s Office Cpl. Jason Hopkins, also a certified paramedic, rendered aid to that victim which included administering an IV and advanced lifesaving care.
The Charles County Sheriff’s Office also lauded the efforts of local resident Yolanda Davis, who provided an extra fire extinguisher to officers and rendered aid and comfort to the two children before paramedics arrived.
The accident scene called for three medevac helicopters.
“I asked for them and they sent ‘em,” said Thomas Raley, who was duty officer for the Waldorf Emergency Medical Services volunteers when the call was dispatched.
“They were just getting the [woman] patient out of the car when I arrived,” he said. “I told which units to go to which patient. The scene was pretty chaotic.”
“The duty officer, they’re listening to the radio and after a while you learn to listen for certain things,” said Steve Finch, assistant chief of EMS services for Charles County.
“You can hear by the tone of voices the nature of the call. Before getting dispatched, he [Raley] put himself on the call. He was needed.”
Of the five patients transported to Washington Hospital Center and Children’s Hospital, only one, the infant, has been released. The other four patients are still in serious to stable condition.
The cause of the accident is still under investigation.
Charles County Sheriff Troy Berry cited the “heroic efforts” of the Charles County Sheriff’s Office deputies, the Maryland State Police, fire and EMS services and citizens who stepped forward at great risk to extricate the victims.
“There is no doubt, by the actions taken, they saved that family’s life,” Berry said.
Contact Joseph Norris at joe.norris@thebaynet.com
DashCam Video of the dramatic rescue:
