Community May 05, 2011
Red Cross honors Paul Collins as one of its heroes
Even though the hair on the back of his hands was singed, Paul Collins gave no indication when he went to work on Monday that he had done anything remotely heroic over the weekend. As he and his girlfriend headed to an early-morning antiques show, Collins, a painter in the Environmental Services Department, noticed a car pulled off to the side of the road in Monroe.
They stopped and he ran to the car where he saw a young woman trapped in the car that was rapidly being engulfed in flames. Before he could unbuckle her seat belt, he had to pat down the flames that were beginning to attack her lap and hair. He dragged her out and waited for the paramedics to arrive.
Although he downplayed saving a woman from a burning car, the Fairfield County Chapter of the American Red Cross thought what Collins had done was quite heroic and honored him and others recently at a breakfast.
"I’m honored but as I see it, someone needed help and I was there to help," said Collins, ever the modest hero.
In the photo: Nicole Bologna, the woman Paul Collins saved, and members of his department proudly joined him at the breakfast honoring Red Cross heroes. Shown with Bologna and Collins are his fellow YNHH painters, from left: Robert Henderson, Jerome Howard and Mike Aiken; Collins; Bologna; Guy Perry, painter; Lou Donarumo, supervisor, Environmental Services; and James Alogna, painter.
