Kane County (Illinois) Sheriff Ron Hain, left, and Board Chair Corinne Pierog, right, pose with Carnegie Hero Lewis A. Medina during a Dec. 13, 2022, presentation at the Kane County Board office in Geneva, Illinois in which Medina was presented with the Carnegie Medal. Medina pulled a man from an SUV before it was hit by an oncoming train a year earlier.
“If we can just reach out to other people and let them know we love them or that we care, then we’d all be in a better spot,” said Medina, according to a Dec. 15, 2022, article in the Daily Herald.
In October 2021, Medina responded to an SUV stuck on a train track at a crossing. While on the phone with 911, Medina saw a train approaching. Panicked, he ran to the side of the vehicle and shouted for the driver to get out of the car but received no response. Medina pulled open the driver’s side door, and shouted to the man, who appeared dazed, to leave his vehicle. Soon, alarms sounded and the gates descended. Medina unbuckled the man’s seatbelt and pulled him from the vehicle. The man fell to the tracks while Medina was removing him, at which point Medina dragged and rolled the man to safety about six seconds before the train collided with the SUV, throwing the vehicle about 1,000 feet into roadside vegetation.
“I really am thankful,” said Medina to a reporter, informing them that his acceptance speech was inspired by the Scripture on the back of the medal, John 15:13: “Greater love hath no man than this, that a man lay down his life for his friends.”
Photo courtesy of Kane County Public Information Office.