Life-saver lifted car wreckage
PC Andrew Dear was the first on the scene of a horrific road crash. A car had been ripped in half and the driver was trapped underneath after being thrown through the open sun roof. As fuel leaked from the wreckage, meaning it could catch fire at any moment, the Warwickshire Police officer crawled underneath, then bore its weight on his back to let the badly injured driver breathe. PC Dear says: “We were met with a scene of devastation really, bits of car over both carriageways, an upturned car, the rear axle had been ripped from the car and travelled around 20 metres and demolished a garden wall. A high-speed impact and probably somebody was seriously injured.”
PC Dear, 50, scrambled into a 10-inch gap under the roof of the flipped car to ensure an airway was maintained, while also taking some of the weight of the mangled vehicle on his back.
Despite being in grave danger himself, he stayed talking to the driver, who was drifting in and out of consciousness, refusing to leave the man until a paramedic arrived. The policeman said he was driven by what the driver’s family would probably be thinking had he not made it.
He said: “Knowing somebody was there with him when he was injured, trapped – that means everything.”
His actions were even more remarkable given that he was suffering from post-traumatic stress disorder after being in a fatal car crash while off duty nine years earlier.
He was seriously injured in another crash while working a shift in 2014.
Philip Seccombe, Warwickshire Police and Crime Commissioner, said PC Dear was “the bravest of the brave, stepping forward heroically to protect a member of the public without a second thought to his own safety”.