SAN ANTONIO, Texas – An officer with the St. Mary’s University Police Department says he was “just doing his job” when he rescued a woman from a burning car early Wednesday.
Sgt. Ken Hamilton actually was off duty, on his way home from work around 3 a.m., when he came upon the scene on Bandera Road near Evers Road.
“I see some flames on the side of the road. I slowed down and looked and realized it was a car up on its side and it was on fire,” he said.
Hamilton, who has worked in law enforcement for the past 27 years, says he just did what came naturally -- stopped his truck and got out to help.
Two other men who had gotten there just before him told him there was a woman trapped inside and they were not able to get her out.
He then tried to break a window.
“I started with my asp -- my baton -- and that wasn't going very well. It was just cutting a hole and the flames were getting bigger,” Hamilton said. “So one of the young men asks me if I wanted a rock. He comes back with a piece of concrete.”
Using that slab of concrete and kicking with his feet, Hamilton says he finally was able to shatter the windshield.
“I had to reach back in over her door and cut her seat belt,” he said. “I wasn't gonna let her burn. Not while I was there. That was all that was going through my brain.”
He says he pulled the woman out of the car just as the flames were reaching her feet.
Within two minutes, the entire car had become engulfed in flames, he says.
According to San Antonio police officers at the scene, the woman suffered only minor injuries and was taken to a hospital by ambulance.
Despite what he did to save her, though, Hamilton says he doesn’t consider himself a hero.
“I was just doing my job,” he said, humbly.