KEESLER AIR FORCE BASE, Miss. --
Sometimes in a stressful, potentially life-threating circumstance, a level head and a willingness to act are two excellent resources available to help resolve the situation.
Over the course of three months in early 2017, three 403rd Wing members lent their assistance in separate, hazardous situations. Master Sgt. Danielle Allaire, 41st Aerial Port Squadron passenger service supervisor, Master Sgt. Steve Martin, 41st Aerial Port Squadron aerial delivery manager, and Tech. Sgt. Heather Alvarez, 403rd Wing education and training technician, each came to the aid of people in need – Allaire to a person who was showing signs of a heart attack on an airline flight, and Martin and Alvarez to residents for two separate house fires.
Allaire was on a flight from Hawaii to Guam on her way to perform annual tour at Anderson Air Force Base, Guam, March 4-18, 2017. About halfway into the eight-hour flight, Allaire heard an announcement over the plane’s intercom requesting anyone who could provide medical assistance. Since Allaire works as a nurse in her civilian career, she decided to see what she could do to help.
“There was a (middle-aged) gentleman in the back of the plane who was experiencing shortness of breath… and he looked panicked, so I thought initially he was having a panic attack,” said Allaire. She noted that his symptoms progressively started to get worse. “He was having severe chest pain, which kind of screams heart attack.”
Allaire mentioned he was still pretty coherent at this point, so she and three other medical personnel who showed up – a U.S. Navy nurse, medic, and a civilian doctor – were trying to keep him talking and learn some of his medical history. At this point, the man was starting to feel tired and confused, and Allaire could tell that he was trying to focus on his breathing, so he was given an oxygen tank and mask.
At one point the passenger’s eyes rolled into the back of his head and he started convulsing, so Allaire and the other medical personnel helped him to the front of the plane so they could have more room to work on him.
When they got him into one of the seats in the first-class section, Allaire said they decided to treat him as if he was having a heart attack, even though with the equipment they had they couldn’t determine if that’s what he really suffering from at this point. They administered an IV and gave him nitroglycerin tablets and baby aspirin, which were available in the plane’s first aid kit, and continued to monitor his pulse and respiration during the rest of the flight until they landed in Guam and transferred him to medical services on the ground.
Emergency medical services then loaded the patient into an ambulance and drove him to a hospital on the island, but Allaire said she wasn’t able to follow up on his condition due to medical privacy laws. However, as stressful and tense as the situation was, she said she was glad she was able to help him on the flight and treat him until he was able to receive further medical attention. She also credited her Air Force career in helping with her career as a nurse.
“I think my entire experience in the air transportation career field has helped me to be a better nurse,” said Allaire. “The thing with these career fields is that you never know when things are going to change, or when the mission is going to change and you’re going to have to swap from one thing to the other. So being quick on your feet and taking initiative, and being clearheaded… all of that helps you in making decisions for the task at hand.”
About a month later, another aerial port member had a situation of his own to handle that required taking initiative and being clearheaded.
Master Sgt. Steve Martin, an air reserve technician with 41st APS, had just returned to his home Gulfport, Mississippi, on the afternoon of April 6 after having finished working for the day at Keesler AFB, when he noticed smoke coming out of the roof of one of his neighbor’s homes. Still in his Air Force uniform, he decided to investigate.
After having checked around the outside of the house, he tried the front door and noticed it was unlocked. The smoke was already pretty thick, and after a few minutes of searching inside, he finally noticed his neighbor in the kitchen area struggling to battle the smoke.
“She was still trying to put out the fire, and in my mind, I was thinking that we just needed to get out now,” said Martin. “It was hard enough for me to breathe and see at that point, so I’m sure it had to be even harder for her.”
He finally convinced her to leave the house with him, and Martin, his neighbor and her dog all managed to get out safely. A few minutes later, fire and rescue trucks showed up on the scene to put out the fire.
Martin and his family helped his neighbor to find a hotel to stay in until repairs could be made on her home. H said he was glad he was able to help out and persuade her to leave when he did.
“All of her stuff can be replaced, but you can’t replace a human life,” said Martin.
Almost a month after that, another 403rd Wing member came to assist with another home blaze.
Tech. Sgt. Heather Alvarez, a reservist with the wing’s education and training office, had returned home after a morning run May 2. She lives in Keesler’s base housing with her two-year-old daughter and husband, an active-duty instructor at Keesler AFB who was deployed for annual tour to South America at the time. In the subdivision just outside of the base, she noticed thick, black smoke rising up into the sky.
“I wasn’t sure if maybe someone was just doing yard work or what it could be. I had my daughter with me and I debated calling it in, but I decided to walk over to see and just to be sure,” said Alvarez.
With her daughter in tow, she walked out the base’s gate toward the smoke, and as she neared it she realized the smoke and flames were coming from the carport of the house.
Alvarez ran up and started banging on the carport door and windows, calling out to see if anyone was still inside. Right at that moment a car pulled up with two other people she knew from Keesler. Tech. Sgt. Tarheisha Alvarez, an instructor with the 335th Training Squadron, and retired Master Sgt. Eric Andrews, stepped out to help. After trying the doorbell, Tarheisha noticed the front door was unlocked, and she ran in to see if anyone was still inside while Andrews called 911, and Heather waited outside with her daughter.
A younger and older man had been in the house, still sleeping, while the fire had been burning; Tarheisha’s shouting managed to wake them, and they all exited the home safely. Heather helped unravel the house’s garden hose, which she gave to the younger man so he could try to start battling the fire. A few minutes later, fire and rescue trucks arrived at the scene.
“Luckily no one was hurt, and it didn’t look like their property was damaged too badly, so I’m glad everything turned out fine,” said Heather. She also was grateful Tarheisha and Andrews showed up when they did to help out.
After relating her story, Heather commented on the importance of maintaining situational awareness and keeping an eye out for anything unusual.
“If you’re not paying attention to anything that might be out of the norm, then you could miss out on something, and someone could get hurt… it could have been a lot worse,” said Heather.
This situational awareness, coupled with a level head and willingness to act, are often essential ingredients in helping to keep bad situations from turning into worse ones.