John W. Norman, 17, schoolboy, saved La Verne M. Bemberg, 34, and helped to save Leland G. Renshaw, 35, sales manager, aircraft company, and J. Grant Robertson, 39, vice president, aviation service, from burning, Wolcott, Colorado, June 2, 1954. Mrs. Bemberg, Renshaw, Robertson, John, and his father John I. Norman were aboard a twin-engined airplane which crashed and overturned on a wooded slope. The impact battered the nose and ripped loose the engines and the wing fuel-tanks, one of the tanks landing 20 feet from the airplane. Renshaw and Robertson sustained severe injuries and lost consciousness; Mrs. Bemberg suffered a fractured arm; and John and his father were stunned. Fastened in their safety belts, all hung head downward from their seats in the cabin. Gasoline escaping from the tank flowed beneath the wreckage and ignited. John, who unfastened his safety belt, discovered an opening a foot high beneath the crumpled door of the front compartment and crawled outside. He had suffered a hand burn from flames near the opening, saw that the nose and the opposite side of the airplane had caught fire, and immediately reentered. Heat in the cabin was intense. John crawled to Mrs. Bemberg, released her safety belt, and lowered her to the cabin roof. She followed John to the opening, and he wriggled through it and with effort pulled her from the cabin. Lowering himself to the cabin roof, Norman crawled to Renshaw and released his safety belt. Norman crawled backward dragging Renshaw to a window. Kicking out the window, he crawled from the cabin. John joined his father and helped him pull Renshaw through the window opening. After Renshaw and Mrs. Bemberg had been moved a safe distance away, Norman crawled back into the cabin. The flames at the nose and along the fuselage had attained a height of six to eight feet, and the heat in the cabin was almost unbearable. Crawling to Robertson, Norman unclasped his belt, dragged him to the window, and aided him outside with assistance from John. Less than two minutes after they carried Robertson clear of the airplane, the flames spread to the cabin, finally consuming all but the metal parts of the craft. Residents of a nearby ranch who witnessed the crash summoned a physician and an ambulance, and all of the airplane occupants were removed to a hospital. Mrs. Bemberg was hospitalized four days. Renshaw recovered in two months. Robertson, who also sustained burns of the leg and body, was disabled four months. John and his father were treated for minor injuries. John’s hand burn healed normally. 43190-3976
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43190-3976