A hero among us: Local 105 member helps save woman’s life on Los Angeles highway

Los Angeles is famous for its traffic. And a large part of that (in)famy is driven by the East Los Angeles Interchange, where Interstate 10 connects with United States Highway 101. Hundreds of thousands of drivers going to, from and through downtown L.A. connect via the two highways daily — including Local 105 member Margarito Martinez, who currently works night shifts as a foreman for Thermal Concepts in Chino, California.

That’s precisely where he was headed on May 9 at 4:40 p.m., when he happened to look out the window on his drive to work and see a woman experiencing a seizure behind the wheel.

“I’m not a doctor,” Martinez said. “I’m no nurse, but, you know, just doing all the [safety] training I’ve been doing all these years, even when I was in the apprenticeship, prepared me to see what was going on.”

The traffic during rush hour on a weekday, Martinez explained, can be near gridlock. On May 9, as he commuted to work, cars were driving on the interchange at speeds under five miles per hour. That provided the ability to see more than usual.

“I noticed a lot of the cars were just going around a car that was acting weird,” Martinez recalled. “So as I got closer to the car, I looked over and I saw a lady foaming from her mouth. She just had a white pile of foam on her chest. And as I got closer, I looked over and it just kicked in for me. You know, I run work, I’m trained for this stuff, so instinct kicked in.”

None of the other drivers were stopping or taking action — but on the other side of the woman’s vehicle, Martinez made eye contact with another work truck.

“I don’t know who he was, but he had a passenger, and we made eye contact and we both agreed … we’ve got to help this lady,” he said.

Martinez and his fellow worker leapt into action. They jumped out of their respective vehicles and ran towards the woman’s car, at which point Martinez said he noticed the woman was “turning blue.” The car was still moving — as the other Good Samaritan tried to slow the car, Martinez pushed a window down.

“I tried opening the door, but she was unconscious. I shook her and she kind of looked surprised, looked at me, like, ‘what are you doing to me?’ And I said, I’m trying to save your life,” he described. “I told her, you’ve got to put your car in park. [But] … for some reason, her body seemed stuck. And she said, ‘oh my God, it’s happening again.’”

The woman started seizing, Martinez said: Her eyes rolled back and she began foaming at the mouth.

“That’s when I jumped more into the window,” he recounted.

Martinez was able to reach the door and open it, and the woman briefly regained consciousness. She tried to put the car in park but accidentally started to reverse instead; Martinez jumped back into the car and hit the emergency brake.

“That’s when she looked at me again. She said, ‘thank you so much, sir, but it’s going to happen again.’ And sure enough, she started seizing again,” he said.

Martinez held her head back to make sure she didn’t choke. Once the woman regained consciousness, he asked two women behind the car to call 911. The ambulance arrived shortly after, bringing the medical attention the woman needed.

Martinez had to leave when the ambulance came — “I can’t be late,” he remembered thinking.

But before he hit the road again, the paramedics told him that had he not acted, the woman could have crashed, been hit or simply not woken up.

Local 105 paid tribute to Martinez on Facebook, writing: “Margarito, your courage and dedication reflect the very best of Local 105. Your commitment to the safety and well-being of those around you — on and off the job — makes us incredibly proud. Thank you for your service to the community and for representing SMART Local 105 with such integrity. Keep leading by example!”

To Martinez, it was nothing heroic — it was simply a combination of union training and union values.

“I didn’t even think about myself to be honest. It was just: Help this lady out,” he reflected.

“All this training we do … it did do something. I did not panic … it felt like the right thing to do.”