A member of the US army academy’s college football team has been hailed as “heroic” after he and his father pulled the driver of a wrecked car out of the vehicle shortly before it erupted in flames over the Labor Day weekend, according to officials and video of the daring rescue.
The video shows Larry Pickett Jr and his father, Larry Pickett Sr, as they take a man out of the driver’s seat of the car and then carry him to safety across a four-lane highway early on Sunday.
“Larry, come on! Come on, get him out – that’s it!” a woman screams on the video, which soon shows the car engulfed in fire as well as surrounded by sparking wires.
Pickett Jr’s sister, Lauren, recorded the video after the white sedan smashed into a utility pole on a road in Fort Montgomery, New York, about four miles from the US army academy in West Point.
Pickett Jr had played his first football game of the season for the army college football squad at its home stadium earlier in the evening, registering an assisted tackle in kickoff coverage as his Black Knights lost in overtime. He and his family had encountered the crash on their way after having dinner in Times Square in New York City.
They stayed with the driver until first responders arrived.
“What car is this?” a confused man can be heard saying on Lauren’s video amid popping sounds in the background. A man on the video – which circulated widely on social media – can then be heard replying, “That’s your car. You hear it? That’s the tires popping.”
Pickett Jr later told the US sports news website The Athletic that he and his father leapt into action upon seeing the accident because they knew the crashed car was going to ignite “and whoever was in there was going to burn up”.
“We couldn’t just watch and let that happen,” Pickett Jr said to the publication. “We got out, ran over, jumped over [a] power line, opened the door.
“He still had his seatbelt on. What if we got there just a minute later?”
According to what Pickett Sr recounted to WTVD in his family’s home town of Raleigh, North Carolina, his son and namesake “mentioned his military training kicked in” as they went in to help.
Army officials were exuberant over Pickett Jr’s role in the rescue.
The 20-year-old “embodies the highest values of the army and West Point: duty, honor, country”, the military branch’s secretary, Dan Driscoll, said in a social media post. “He showed that he can stand ready to act under pressure, whether on the football field, in his community, or in the future with the soldiers under his command.
“We are proud – and deeply grateful – for his heroism.”
Tom Theodorakis, the academy athletic director, wrote on social media that Pickett Jr and Pickett Sr “exemplify the values we hold dear, stepping up in a moment of crisis to save a life”.
“Proud to see these traits in action, on and off the fields of friendly strife,” Theodorakis added. “Count the brave.”
The West Point institution whose official name is the US Military Academy struck a similar tone, publishing a social media post which declared itself as “proud of the heroic actions” taken by Pickett Jr and Pickett Sr.
In a statement accompanying his daughter’s viral video, Pickett Sr said, “Thank you Jesus that this man will live to see another day! I am so grateful for my son LJ for saving his life!”
He also wrote: “This is more than a display of leadership; it’s a testament to the character West Point is building in him – a readiness to go into the line of fire, not just for his country, but for anyone who needs it. To see that courage and selflessness in action firsthand was truly incredible.”
The Associated Press contributed reporting
