You can’t really know what you’ll do when faced with an emergency until you happen upon one.
Dusten Barker no longer has to wonder how he would react.
“Somebody was trapped in the car and the car is on fire,” Dusten said.
He and his wife, Rosina, were on Highway 6 Sunday morning when they came across downed power lines. They took a quick video of the sparking wire when they saw someone waving for help.
“There’s a car down there. It’s on fire. There’s like a person,” Dusten said. “I could see a shape in there moving.”
Dusten ran toward the burning car while Rosina called 911. The vehicle had broken the pole and came to a stop near the bayou below, where it caught fire just minutes before the Barkers pulled up.
“There’s flames engulfing the car. They’re everywhere. Power lines over there. Periodically, there’s like a spark and stuff, it’s kind of like hell,” Dusten said “Then, I see a hand come out of the flames.”
The driver, Vanessa Medina, who just turned 18, was trapped inside the burning car for several minutes.
“I just yanked. I just pulled her out of the hole in the door, and started shuffling back up the embankment,” Dusten said.
Jacqueline Buendia was the passenger in the car who flagged down the Barkers.
“Thank God they were here,” Jacqueline said.
She said she and Vanessa had just left a Whataburger and they were both tired. Jacqueline said she was sleeping when the crash happened.
“I broke the sunroof and I got out the car, and I went up to the street hoping there was cars passing by,” she said.
Jacqueline and the Medina family met the Barkers when Dusten was released from the hospital Monday. He was treated for smoke inhalation.
Vanessa has third degree burns to much of her body. She’s in the intensive care unit unable to speak, but she’s stable.
“They were very brave, very brave,” said Vanessa’s sister, Jasmine Medina. “Jackie reached out to them and asked for help. Not a lot of people will help you, especially in a burning car. These people are angels.”
Dusten said he’s far from an angel or hero.
“I’m not the guy to do this,” Dusten said. “I’m not fit. I’m kind of broken.”
But Rosina said she wasn’t at all surprised to see him run toward the flames
“I always knew he had a good heart. I knew he would do something like this,” Rosina said. “Deep down, you just know people, right? But to actually see him go out and do it, I couldn’t be prouder.”
