PEMBROKE, N.Y. (WKBW) — A good Samaritan, whose quick actions may have saved a young girl's life after a bus crashed on I-90, is seeking the public's help in reconnecting with the family he did everything to help.
On Friday, Direk Dantzler, who is from the Utica area, was driving down the New York State Thruway from Buffalo to Rochester when the deadly tour bus crash happened right in front of him.
“I couldn’t just drive by that,” Dantzler said. “If it was me, I’d want somebody to stop for me.”
“I had seen the bus pull into the median, grass portion,” Dantzler said. “[The driver] tried to get control of it, and it seems like when it went further over [towards the road], he yanked it and it just did a backflip onto its side…It went sideways, and I had seen one of the guys come out of the window, front window.”
Dantzler told me he jumped into action, remembering some medical skills he learned while training to be a bridge painter with the DC-4 union.
WATCH: 'I'd really like to reach out': Tour bus crash witness wants to reconnect with the family he helped
Dantzler said he helped one woman whose hand was trapped under the wheel of the bus, made makeshift tourniquets for others, but the one that sticks out to him the most, a young girl he helped. He estimates she is between 3 and 5 years old, with severe injuries to her arm and back.
“I walked up to the first guy, and he had his child on his lap," Dantzler said. "He was trying to hand the child to me, this little girl. He said, 'Help me, please,' crying. So, I ran back to the car to grab rags from work for cleanup. I balled the rags up and told him to apply pressure there and keep it there...I promised him that his daughter is going to be alright.”
Five people died in that bus crash, the youngest being 22 years old, which means that the little girl survived, all thanks to Dantzler.
Dantzler never got their names, but he hasn’t forgotten them, sending me this picture of the girl’s father in hopes of finding them again.
Q: “Why do you want to reach out to them?”
Dantzler: “I promised him she would be OK. [I want to] send them a card or stuffed animals.”
A promise made and kept. Now, Dantzler is just hoping to see their faces one more time.
