Romeoville Police Officer Woodsman "Woody" Jones, retired Burbank Police Officer Wayne Young, and Chicagoan Ernesto Irizarry, who is trying to become a police officer, don't know each other.
But all had the same thing on their minds early Sunday morning as they came upon a car in flames after a wreck on the Stevenson Expressway near Darien -- Get the driver out of that car.
"You do what you have to do," said the 66-year-old Young. "I would hope that everybody would do something like that."
According to Illinois State Police Elgin District Sgt. Bruce Orns, the accident was caused by a man driving an SUV the wrong way about 5:30 a.m. on Int. Hwy. 55 at Lemont Road. That man, who died in the accident, plowed into a southbound SUV driven by the young man pulled from the burning car.
Jones, 38, was in full uniform in a squad car on his way to an unrelated matter at Loyola University Medical Center in Maywood when he saw the crashed SUVs on the other side of the road.
"There were no other vehicles there so I stopped to assist," said Jones, a 13-year veteran of the Romeoville Police Department and former military officer.
Jones, who had been northbound on I-55, called for backup and sped around to the southbound lanes to reach the mangled SUVs.
"I jumped the median and went over there," said Jones, who first saw the driver of the wrong-way vehicle. "He was unconscious and not looking okay. He was partially hanging out of the car."
Jones, seeing the other SUV in flames that were "spreading quickly," rushed toward it and saw that it also had only one occupant.
By this time, at least two other men stopped to help Jones -- Young and Irizarry.
"We decided we needed to get him out of the vehicle," Jones said.
"Typically we like to keep (victims) in the car to maintain the spine and keep it so that they're not moving and you don't want to have any wounds open up, but the vehicle was on fire," Jones said. The motorist, who appeared to possibly be a teenage boy, apparently suffered a broken leg, Jones said.
Jones and Young carried the driver out of the SUV with Irizarry helping, clearing a space to lay the man down before racing over to the other SUV.
"We tried to help the other guy in the other vehicle but it was smashed and pinned up against the median and we couldn't get to him," said Irizarry, 24, who was coming off a midnight shift as a security guard in River North and was headed towards his parents' home in Romeoville.
Then their attention turned back to the first driver, who appeared to be in more danger as the flames grew. Irizarry and Jones moved him again -- about two minutes before the SUV became a fireball.
"The fire got so big and hot, we were afraid it was going to explode," Jones said. "The tires were popping."
"We got him a blanket and made sure he was okay," Irizarry said. "Mr. Young was talking to him, making sure he stayed conscious and called his family.
"Had he stayed in the car he would have been engulfed in flames."
Young had plans to get back to his west suburban home and back to bed once he'd returned from Midway International Airport after dropping off a Tennessee friend in town for the holidays. Then he saw the crash.
"I just figured I better stop and lend a hand,"' said Young. "I went over to the SUV this young man was in. There was a fire in the engine compartment."
After Young and Jones had gotten the young man out of the burning SUV and to the side of the road, the victim, wearing a name tag, was coherent enough to tell Young and the officer that he was on his way to work when it happened.
"He was hurt (but) he was okay," Young said. "He said he saw a car coming toward him and he tried to swerve out of the path of it but couldn't get out of the way."
The victim then pulled out his cell phone, dialed his father and asked Young to talk to him.
"I reassured him (the father) that he was OK and conscious," said Young. "And he thanked me for stopping and helping his son."
According to Young, the victim was taken to Advocate Good Samaritan Hospital in Downers Grove.
Meanwhile, another Romeoville officer had arrived and was giving CPR to the other motorist. The DuPage County Coroner's Office said he was pronounced dead on the scene but has not yet identified him pending notification of next of kin..
After lending his hand at the accident site, Irizarry got home about 45 minutes late, where he was greeted by his mother. "She wasn't too worried but she was really sad about the accident," he said.
"The funny thing is I'm trying to become a police officer so she knew that was something that I would do," said Irizarry, who said he has applied to be a Chicago police officer and will be taking a test later this month. He also said he had applied for a job as an officer in Madison, Wis.
"My first thought was to help out," said Irizarry, who could have been sepaking for Jones and Young as well. "I was just to try to help out and get people to safety."
The condition of the surviving driver, who was taken to a hospital with a leg injury, was not known.
Copyright 2013 - Chicago Tribune
McClatchy-Tribune News Service
