This soldier saved an elderly man who no longer even had hope
Early in the morning, Trooper Tyler Harrington was just beginning his shift when he learned that an 82-year-old man had vanished during a winter storm.
In the latter part of December, an ice storm caused Bernard Perry, an Alzheimer’s patient, to become lost and stray from his Vassalboro, Maine, home.
Just after five in the morning, his distraught wife called 911 to report her husband missing.
At that point, Trooper Harrington jumped in to offer assistance. He said, “Fortunately, Mr. Perry lives only four miles from my place.
Despite the fact that the roadways were coated in snow and ice, Trooper Tyler Harrington stopped a plow driver and asked him if he had seen an elderly guy strolling nearby.
“I had the plow truck driver show me where the last place he had seen him as I followed him over. The plow truck driver pointed in the general area. I was able to shine my flashlight and see Mr. Perry off the roadway in the ditch,” he said.
The old man was unable to speak and was experiencing severe hypothermia and frostbite by the time the trooper reached him. The elderly man was roughly a quarter of a mile from his home and had been in the ditch for around 90 minutes.
He said, “I don’t know how much longer he would have had.”
Trooper Harrington said: “He was unable to walk. I had asked him if he could hear me. He made a groaning noise which led me to believe that I was going to have to carry him to safety.”
Bernard received a blanket while the officer brought him to his car. He was then brought to a hospital to recover.
Trooper Harrington downplayed the importance of his that night’s bravery.
“Ultimately being at the right place, at the right time. Any one of us, any law enforcement, any civilian would have done the exact same thing I did,” he said.
It is a miracle that Trooper Harrington was able to find this individual in the nick of time; else, the outcome could have been extremely different.
