‘I was so afraid I was going to die’
Yonkers man relives Mardi Gras nightmare
Mario Basantes will never forget waking up on the ground, unsure of where he was. As he opened his eyes, he saw his wife, Amy, looking panicked. Next to her stood a woman he didn’t know, praying.
“It took a minute, then I realized she was praying for me.
“That first moment felt like a warm sensation from my head down, and then numbness,” recalled the Yonkers resident, 38. “I was so afraid I was going to die.”
Minutes earlier he had been cheering on costumed revelers in the Endymion parade in New Orleans’ Mid-City neighborhood. Out of nowhere, a gray pickup traveling in the lane opposite the parade route plowed on to the me- dian and into the crowd. Thirty-two people were struck by drunk driver Neilson Rizzuto, resulting in punctured lungs, broken bones and other injuries. Mario, who was run over by the truck’s tires, was hurt the worst: two broken ribs, a broken pelvis, a lacerated liver, a collapsed bladder and a head hematoma. His right leg was crushed. Amy remembered how “I couldn’t see him breathing. It was the scariest moment.” (Amazingly, she escaped injury after having walked 10 feet away to snap a photo.) Within hours, Mario, an avid horse rider, was in surgery. Because of the nerve damage to his leg, doctors could not say whether he would be able to walk on it again. He spent three days in ICU, followed by a month in the surgical ward and a week in rehab. He’s been stuck in New Orleans ever since. “It was a weekend trip. We [aren’t] supposed to be here,” said Mario, a night manager at Land & Sea restaurant in The Bronx. Amy had surprised her husband with a road trip to Mardi Gras for his 38th birthday. They packed in as many parades as possible, which Mario described as “perfect. People just want to have fun. Nobody’s looking for trouble.” The Feb. 25 parade was supposed to be the couple’s last before heading back to NYC the next day.
Since Mario was discharged from the hospital, they have been staying with a friend, Allison Reinhardt, who was also hit by Rizzuto, sustaining a punctured lung and broken ribs and arm. (Rizzuto has been charged with 14 counts of first-degree vehicular negligent injuring and 12 counts of vehicular negligent injury. He has pleaded not guilty and is currently in jail awaiting trial.) Reinhardt’s neighbors pitched in to build a ramp to her front door so that Mario, now in a wheelchair, has more freedom to get to rehab four days a week.
“I’m at a loss for words for the kindness even strangers have shown me,” he said.
Later this month, doctors hope to tell Mario whether he might be able to walk again. Right now, he and Amy aren’t sure when they’ll go home, as their Yonkers apartment is not equipped for a wheelchair.
Mario just applied for disability benefits and hopes to be rehired at the restaurant once he’s strong enough to work a 14-hour shift. Amy’s employer — By the Way Bakery in Westchester — is holding her position until she returns.
Mario’s teenage daughters, both from a previous relationship, are scared about the future, he said. He FaceTimes with them every day, and even received a surprise visit from his older daughter, who lived with him and Amy before the accident, on his birthday, March 12.
When he was hit, all of Mario’s Mardi Gras beads were ripped off his body, but his Yankees cap remained intact. “I consider it a good luck charm. I keep it by my bedside,” he said. But he admitted his spirits flagged on the day of his beloved team’s home opener. “We would have been there,” he said. “That was one of my hardest days. All I want is to be home right now.”