Some intense vehicle crashes take all the help first responders have to offer, even if they are off-duty. The New Jersery Turnipike has many crashes, requiring heavy first responder response.

Intense Box Truck Crash

Jordan Reed was one of the witnesses to an intense collision between a tractor-trailer and a sign pole. As he was driving southbound on the New Jersey Turnpike, he saw the truck slam into the pole and quickly ignite.

Reed is an emergency medicine physician's assistant and has ten years of EMT experience. He immediately pulled over and went to assist the driver, who was on fire.

"He had been already removed from his truck by a New Jersey corrections officer who had stopped on scene, and we were able to extinguish him using a blanket that I had taken from my truck and a fire extinguisher provided by a bystander."

Jordan Reed

The driver sustained severe burns and was taken to the hospital for treatment. Reed made sure to give credit to the corrections officer who pulled the driver out of the vehicle all the credit, since he "risked his own life to get the driver out of the burning vehicle."

SUV Crash

The box truck crash was not the first time the correction officer stepped in to assist in a car accident. New Jersey Corrections Officer and Wood-Ridge firefighter Dan O' Beirne was driving his motorcycle when he saw an SUV on and embankment.

Behind him on the road were Wood-Ridge Officer Mark Torsiello with Rutherford volunteer EMT Walter Rogers and in a vehicle behind them was NJ Correction Officer Chris Araujo.

They all saw O'Beirne switch lanes and throw his helmet off, and they quickly saw why and headed that same direction. The men all pulled over, jumped out of their cars and ran as fast as they could to the crash site.

Rescuing Passengers

Torsiello said, "All we could hear was screaming, but no one was getting out." Inside were three women stuck in the backseat with the airbags deployed. Another passenger has already gotten out of the vehicle.

Torsiello said they seemed to have hit a tree. Rogers helped clean and bandage a woman bleeding leg, while they waited for NJ Transit police and State Police to arrive, since O' Bierne had already called 911.

O'Beirne said,"Helping others has always been second-nature to me. I love having the tools to do it."