Salamonia’s Smith rose to occasion

Editor’s note: This column is being reprinted from Aug. 5, 2004. Marvel movies are a fun escape. But real superheroes are around us every day. Bruce Smith of Salamonia more than earned his superhero stripes 20 years ago.

Everyone, I think, has had the daydream at one time or another.

You’re going along, minding your own business when you chance upon the scene of an accident, or maybe a house fire. Then, without a thought for your personal safety, you rise to the occasion. You meet one of life’s toughest tests and perform heroically.

It’s a great daydream.

But if you’re Bruce Smith of Salamonia, it’s not fiction. It’s reality.

Smith, 31, owner operator of Precision Paint and Power Wash, doesn’t feel comfortable with the word “hero.” But that’s what he is.

On the Fourth of July holiday weekend, he and his wife Brooke were on their way back to Jay County from Muncie after dinner at Applebee’s with their friend Pat Sheffer.

Bruce is president of the Friends of the Salamonia School, and Pat’s the treasurer.

When they reached the intersection of Ind. 67 and the Muncie Bypass, they found chaos.

A van was on the side of the road. It was ablaze. And the driver was visible inside.

Incredibly, onlookers were standing on the other side of the road, staring, but frozen by the sight in front of them.

They’d failed their test. Bruce Smith didn’t fail his.

Immediately he turned the car around. “The first thing I did was jump out and run up to a semi,” he said.

He flagged the trucker down, grabbed his fire extinguisher, and went to work on the flames, aiming the extinguisher into the grille and one of the wheel wells.

“Nobody was doing anything,” said Smith. “All of them were saying, ‘It’s gonna explode.’ People have seen too many movies … I don’t know why they weren’t reacting. I don’t understand it. Me, all I did was react.”

When Smith took action, it jarred two other Samaritans to life.

The flames were knocked down quickly, and the three found themselves face to face with a new challenge. The driver — Todd Buchanan of Indianapolis — was a quadriplegic. His wheelchair was also the driver’s seat, and he was strapped in place three ways — across the chest, at the waist, and at his legs.

Buchanan, with supernatural calm, explained to his rescuers how to get him out. But there was little time. When the flames flared up again, Smith used the last of a second fire extinguisher.

“The windshield was melting out of the van while we were talking,” Smith recalled.

Quickly unstrapping Buchanan, Smith reached into the burning van. “I grabbed ahold of him and yanked on him. He was still caught.” It took a few precious seconds more to free the driver.

Smith then carried him about 30 yards away and placed him on the ground.

When firefighters arrived on the scene, Smith made sure they knew where to find the driver.

He gave them his name if they had any questions, then he simply turned and left.

“There was no need to stick around,” he said. “I’m not big on the spotlight, never have been … I didn’t think it was a big deal. It’s not something I wouldn’t do for somebody else.”

Not a big deal?

Only about as big as they get.