2019-09-01 Reader\'s Digest

Everyday Heroes Reader’s Digest

rd.com 13

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to have been, as if

planted there. No one

should have survived

this crash, and yet there

was 16-year-old Quintin

Thompson, his terrified

face pressed against the

driver’s side window, in

visible pain. Languell,

35, tried dousing the

fire with his buckets of

water with no success.

“When the flames got

into the front seats, I

realized I had to get

him out of there,” he told WAGM-T V.

In an act that a police report de-

scribed as showing “complete dis-

regard for his own safety,” Languell

opened the Buick’s back door and

crawled in. Thompson was struggling

to get free, Languell says. “That’s when

I noticed how bad his legs were.” Using

a pocketknife he’d had the foresight

to bring with him, he

sawed through Thomp-

son’s seat belt. Now that

Thompson was free of

the restraints, Languell

pulled him out a rear

window of the vehicle,

then dragged the teen

to safety “before the

entire car was engulfed

in flames,” the police

stated.

Although Thompson

suffered multiple frac-

tures to his legs, spine,

and face, a social media post de-

scribed him as “looking great, smil-

ing, and joking.” Languell thinks about

that day often. Displaying the sort of

empathy that compelled him to help,

he told WAGM-T V, “My heart goes out

to [Thompson]. When you are that

close to that level of hurt, you feel it

so directly.” RD

“I feel like I just did what

had to be done,” says

Languell.

Let’s Make Amends

Since 1787, more than 11,000 amendments to the U.S. Constitution have

been proposed; only 27 have been ratified by the states. Some of the rejects:

That the president be selected by lottery

That the country be renamed “the United States of Earth”

That the presidency be abolished and replaced with

a three-person executive council

That divorce be illegal

washington post and constitutioncenter.org