Family rescued from fiery Hwy 63 crash meet Good Samaritan who helped save them
Zoe Scantlebury meets Maurice Poirier (centre), a Good Samaritan who helped rescue her and her family from a fiery crash on Hwy 63 Monday, August 26 – as her father Patrick looks on.
By Julia Parrish, CTV Edmonton
Less than three weeks after a Toronto family was pulled from the wreckage of a serious collision on Highway 63, a bystander who stepped in to help finally met the family he played a role in rescuing.
Back on Monday, August 27, Maurice Poirier was on his way home – driving just north of the Highway 55 junction near Boyle at about 7:30 p.m. when he said the tanker truck behind him tried to make a turn, and the brakes of the truck locked.
In moments, the massive truck jack-knifed, and two vehicles travelling behind the truck collided with it.
Poirier told CTV News at the time that he immediately sprang into action once he saw what had happened.
“I ran to the car to see the injuries and tried to get the people out,” Poirier said at the time.
He said one of the vehicles had four people inside, he watched two people escape, but two others were still inside – he said he helped a young boy by cutting his seatbelt and pulling him out, before helping a number of other bystanders pull a 21-year-old woman out.
By the time she was safe, the vehicle they had all been in was engulfed in flames.