Transportation reporter Steve Bennish helps make sense of our area's road construction spending, infrastructure and traffic. He can be reached at Steve.Bennish@coxinc.com. Follow @WHIOTraffic and listen to AM 1290 and News 95.7 on Mondays at 7:15 a.m. for weekly transportation updates.
At myDaytonDailyNews.com: Video of Titus Brewer and his wife Twana share their story of helping a semi driver after his truck exploded on I-75. Also, watch video from the scene of the incident.
As a semi truck burned out of control on Interstate 75 Thursday, a group of motorists came to the aid of the driver as he fought to extinguish his burning clothes, dragging him from what could have been fiery death on the highway.
The harrowing story is told by Titus Brewer, 55, and his wife Twana, 54, both of Dayton. The couple were driving their daughter Tiffany to her job in Springboro when they drove up the Edwin C. Moses entrance ramp to I-75 south.
Just as the three were at the top of the ramp, they saw the flames from the truck.
Titus shouted out, “Stop! Stop,” to his wife, who was driving. “Fire!” as the truck came into view on the other side of the highway.
Titus said he jumped from the vehicle and made his way over a concrete highway barrier to the other side. Other motorists were stopping to see if they could render assistance, too, he said.
At that moment, the semi driver could be seen desperately trying to escape. It’s unclear from witnesses whether he left via the door or pushed his way out of the broken front windshield.
Daughter Tiffany tried to direct traffic, avoiding passing cars and they drove past the scene.
“It was a chaotic scene and people swarming in to help him,” Twana said.
Titus said he kept moving forward and got as close as he could — perhaps eight feet — from the burning rig, trying to assess the danger and see what happened to the driver.
The semi driver had gotten out at this point and dropped to a spot next to the front tire.
His clothes were on fire. A stream of flaming diesel liquid began snaking down the highway. Titus could feel the intense heat from the flames. There were explosions.
Tires were blowing out from the flames and heat. Titus couldn’t get closer without being burned by the intense heat.
“Roll! Roll! Roll!,” Titus said he and other motorists-turned-rescuers yelled at the driver. The driver rolled on the highway, extinguishing most of the fire except his pant legs.
Titus said he and other men — who have not yet been identified — jumped in and then dragged the man away from the truck, his pants smoking.
“I didn’t think about me,” Titus said. “I was seeing a father, somebody’s uncle, somebody who needed help. He needed to get out of there.”
His wife Twana brought over a blanket and bottles of drinking water to help extinguish the flames.
With the help of a law enforcement officer who arrived, the group poured the water on driver to help extinguish the flames. The driver looked badly burned on the legs and on his mid-section, Titus said.
Twana recorded the scene on her cellphone, the driver in the foreground, barely able to speak, the truck burning out of control before fire personnel arrived.
Titus, a former janitor, considers the driver lucky. Twana, who works for the YMCA in downtown Dayton as an administrative assistant, is still somewhat in shock by the ordeal.
Both deny they are heroes.
“It was a team effort,” said Titus. “People working together to help.”
The three left before talking to emergency responders and drove their daughter to work. As quickly as the rescuers jumped into action, they departed and went their separate ways, Titus said.
When he looked up, “the guys that helped me pull him out, they were all gone,” Titus said.
As near as can be determined, the accident involved the semitrailer and a sedan, shutting down I-75 North about 4 1/2 hours. It remains under investigation by the Moraine Police Department.
The driver of the semitrailer was identified by Moraine Police as 45-year-old Herbert Brown from McKeesport, Pa. He was reported in critical condition at Miami Valley Hospital.
The driver of the Subaru sedan, a 34-year-old woman from Loveland, Ohio, was treated and released.
Moraine Police Sgt. Jon Spencer arrived just after Brown was pulled to the side of the highway. He said the deputy who helped save Brown was Butler County deputy Jody Green, who was on his way to the Montgomery County Jail with a prisoner.
“When I got there, they pulled him off to left side of highway and the truck was fully engulfed and it was an active rescue,” Spencer said. “He was badly injured and they had to put a blanket over him. If he had been stuck in that truck, it would not have turned out as it did.”
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