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Moccasin Staff Honored for Their Heroism

SFPUC staff being honored by CHP Sonora
  • Betsy Lauppe Rhodes

What started out as a typical homeward commute from Moccasin to Sonora turned into a scene straight out of a movie. And the action heroes were the SFPUC's own Moccasin staff.

There are only two possible routes between Moccasin and Sonora, where many Moccasin personnel live. As fate would have it, Andy Birrell, Derek Scholl, Vince Hagins, Shawn Patterson, Joe Lopez, Robert Adams, Jason Dambacher, and John Gisler were all driving home from work at about 4 p.m. one May evening in 2020, when they noticed a truck pull out of an abandoned ghost town in Tuolumne County called Chinese Camp driving erratically.

Scene of truck crash

Some staff members witnessed what happened next, while others pulled up shortly thereafter. The truck sped up, missed a turn, flew off the road, rolled, and hit a power pole. The car landed upright, however, the downed pole started a grass fire, which the wind was pushing toward the badly damaged vehicle and the driver still inside.

Birrell, Scholl, Hagins, Patterson, Lopez, Adams, Dambacher, and Gisler pulled over and jumped into action. They parked their vehicles to control traffic coming around the turn. They pulled out the firefighting equipment that they all carry in their cars to try to slow the progress of the fire before it reached the truck. Using mattocks and backpack fire pumpers, they were able to slow the fire’s progress enough to try to rescue the driver.

The smoke was so thick that they couldn’t see a hand in front of their face. After finally managing to get the door open, the team struggled to get the driver free from the vehicle. His leg was stuck under the brake pedal. All the while, the fire crept closer.

Just as they were able to get the injured driver out and lay him down on the ground, California Highway Patrol, Cal Fire, and eventually an ambulance pulled up to the scene. By that time, the car was engulfed in flames. The driver was safely transported to a local hospital for treatment.

The SFPUC staff all gave detailed written statements to the California Highway Patrol officer who was on scene. Everybody went home and carried on with their normal lives until two years later, they received an unexpected call from the California Highway Patrol, bringing back the memory of that evening. 

On October 27, 2022, the California Highway Patrol held a long-postponed ceremony. “We will be honoring several citizens in our community who went above and beyond by assisting several individuals in their time of need. Those individuals will be recognized and awarded with a token of our appreciation for their bravery and courage.”

The CHP officer who was present on scene that day honored Birrell, Scholl, Hagins, Patterson, Lopez, Adams, Dambacher, and Gisler for their quick action and bravery. Each received a personalized plaque, complete with the details of each of their statements of their individual roles in saving the driver that day.

“All of Hetch Hetchy Water and Power (HHWP) is proud to be able to call this group of heroes, our HHWP coworkers and friends. It really is an honor to have colleagues that demonstrate such selflessness to help others," said Adam Mazurkiewicz, Operations and Maintenance Manager at Hetch Hetchy Water and Power.

The CHP officer relayed how oftentimes when he pulls up to an accident, bystanders are usually doing nothing but filming the scene on their phones, which makes that day all the more remarkable. What he found were eight civilians who acted quickly and put themselves in harm’s way to save a complete stranger.