SMART Transportation Division member and conductor Ben Goar (Local 911), along with engineer Frederick Jarrell, was presented with an award for helping to save seven-year-old William Simondet’s life. The Canadian Pacific conductor and the engineer saw the boy on a steep Mississippi River bluff in St. Paul, Minn., while they were stopped to change crews.
Goar radioed to the St. Paul rail yard and told them to get police and firemen to their location.
Goar then went to yell up to Simondet to keep him distracted so he didn’t fall while Jarrell climbed up the bluff to the rock ledge that the boy stood on. Jarrell then carried the boy on his back to safety.
“I just did what most people would do,” Goar said. “It’s good to see him back with his family.”
Simondet is an autistic boy who had wandered away from home May 11.
Fire Chief Tim Butler gave both men letters of commendation at a ceremony held June 10.
“Your coordinated and impromptu rescue efforts went above and beyond those expected of ordinary citizens,” Butler wrote. “Without your quick thinking, decisive action and selfless courage, the outcome for this child could have been severe.”
Photo courtesy of CP Rail
Related News
- NTS Day 3: Railroad safety improvements driven by member reports
- NTS Day 3: America’s transit safer because of union member efforts
- TD NTS: STB chair and vice chair address officers, assure labor will have input
- TTD president: Labor needs to stick together to maintain progress
- TD National Training Seminar begins; officers train to confidently represent union members
- SMART-TD transit union conducts first Bus/Transit Day on the Hill
- Chairperson ensures that new bus members get what’s owed to them
- LACMTA reconstitutes in-agency police force to protect workers, riders
- Open enrollment for the SMART-TD VLTD and VLIFE plans begins for rail and bus members
- SMART-TD excited to welcome Coaster to its passenger rail/commuter family