MTA Honors Heroic Employees

Today’s AMNY has a nice cover story titled “Everyday Heroes”. The feature is about how the MTA’s New York City Transit branch honored 51 “everyday heroes” yesterday with medals of excellence for acts of bravery or kindness. The article features the 4 men who earned top honors which happens to be a medal for heroism. Here is the article courtesy of AMNY:

The people who keep subways running and buses moving often risk life and limb to save a straphanger or colleague in need.

New York City Transit honored 51 “everyday heroes” Tuesday with medals of excellence for acts of bravery or kindness.

Four men earned the top nod, a medal for heroism.

“I am the official leader of NYCT, but it is the unofficial leaders, and they are being recognized here today, who make the real difference,” New York City Transit President Howard Roberts said at the awards ceremony at Battery Park.

“They are the measure between success and failure as an organization.”

While the most famous subway hero in recent memory is straphanger Wesley Autrey, who jumped onto the tracks in January to cover a man having a seizure while a train ran over both of them, the following four transit workers are this year’s “subway supermen”:

Richard Kerimoglu:

A drunk man who fell onto the subway tracks escaped electrocution thanks to train service supervisor Richard Kerimoglu, 46.

The 22-year subway veteran climbed onto the tracks at the end of the No. 6 line in the Bronx on June 16 to check on an intoxicated man who was lying between two live third rails.

He waited to wake the unconscious man, hoping to keep him from touching either rail until the power was turned off several minutes later.

“I [then] woke him. He was very startled and grabbed the third rail and used it as a support to get up,” he said. “That would have killed him.”

James White:

A teacher on Staten Island walked away from a carjacking on Dec. 13 with her life and her car after bus operator James White ran to her rescue. From a nearby bus depot, White saw a woman being strangled in her car and rescued her from the attacker’s grip.

Ralph Fernandez:

Ralph Fernandez, who did not attend the awards ceremony, stayed on his bus with an elderly man too afraid to evacuate after a midtown steam pipe exploded just feet away in July. Fernandez also safely evacuated other passengers from the bus moments after the eruption.

Andres Morales:

Bus mechanic Andres Morales, 36, rescued his girlfriend and sent an armed robber to jail, all while being repeatedly stabbed in an after-work attack.

Morales had just parked his motorcycle on his way home from work to the couple’s Upper East Side apartment on April 25 when he heard his girlfriend’s screams as a robber held her at knifepoint. Morales freed his girlfriend and tried to hold onto the robber even as he lashed out, stabbing the mechanic four times.

Soft-spoken Morales appreciated his award but gave a nod to fellow employees.

Their tales included risking life and limb or just simple acts of kindness, like human resources manager Imogene Wright who helped a sick bus driver during last month’s transit-crippling floods.

“There’s a lot of good stories,” Morales said.

Reading the feature put a smile on my face & got me to thinking. I hope that the naive people who think all employees are assholes somehow get their hands on this article. Maybe just maybe it will get them to not paint all employees with one broad brush.

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Comments

Blabberwocky…

Enjoyed your articles. Keep them coming…

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