Wednesday, May 18, 2011
By Ed Runyan
SOUTHINGTON
When Air Force Reservist Tom Kocis of Farmdale happened upon the scene of a 71-year-old woman whose van had slipped into a ditch filled with ice-cold water, it didn’t take him long to realize he needed to act.
“I was just helping. It was like I was helping a neighbor,” Kocis, a technical sergeant at the Youngstown Air Reserve Station, said Tuesday during an award ceremony at the Southington Post of the Ohio State Highway Patrol.
Kocis got out of his car, entered the ditch in water up to his chest and helped the woman figure out how to get a window open so he could help her through the window. Then he carried her to safety.
She might have been too short to wade through the water on her own, Kocis said.
The accident happened on state Route 193 in Fowler Township on Feb. 28, as ice and snow were melting. The cold water, coupled with rainfall, caused a stream of water 1 foot deep to rush across state Route 193.
It was that stream of water that caused the woman’s van to get swept off the road, the highway patrol said.
Kocis, whose job in the Air Force Reserve is to maintain spraying equipment used on Air Force aircraft at the base and during deployments, was on his way to the base when he spotted the accident.
The woman had been trapped in the car for as long as 20 minutes, and some water had gotten inside the car, said Lt. Brian Holt, commander of the Southington post.
The woman had gotten wet while she waited for assistance, and the vehicle was totaled by the water damage, the highway patrol said.
Other passers-by had stopped to assist the woman, but no one had attempted to rescue her until Kocis arrived, Holt said, adding that when the reservist acted, it motivated others to also assist.
“He probably saved the life of this woman,” Holt said. “She was without injury, so we will never know” what would have happened if Kocis hadn’t acted, Holt said.
The woman did not attend the ceremony.
The commander added that Kocis and the woman were gone by the time troopers arrived at the scene, and Kocis didn’t seek recognition for his act.
“We had to find him. He didn’t stick around to get the glory,” Holt said.
Holt presented Kocis with a certificate of recognition.