Friday, February 9, 2007 9:37 PM CST
FD honors young hero
Child gets ride in fire truck for helping save mom
By ROB STROUD, Staff Writer
rstroud@jg-tc.com
CHARLESTON -- Firefighter-paramedics Matt MacDonald and Kent Winnett rushed to a home early Jan. 24 expecting to treat a woman for severely low blood sugar.
MacDonald said the woman’s 5-year-old daughter greeted them at the door and took them upstairs, where they found her mother was OK. He said the girl, Tehya Lones, had successfully treated her mother’s condition after calling 911 for assistance.
“This girl did a remarkable job,” MacDonald said. “She kept her head and did what she was supposed to do.”
On Tuesday, the Charleston Fire and Rescue Department honored Tehya’s heroic actions by picking her up at Mark Twain Elementary School in a fire truck and taking her to breakfast at McDonald’s. The restaurant paid for breakfast for her and the firefighters as well as provided Happy Meal toys for her and her classmates.
The firefighters then brought her back to Mark Twain, where she received a trophy and ribbon from the school in front of her fellow students.
MacDonald said Tehya called 911 for help at approximately 5 a.m. Jan. 24 as her mother, Trevon Lones, began experiencing severely low blood sugar. He said this sometimes happens to diabetics in the morning after they have taken their insulin the night before.
The firefighter-paramedic said Tehya raised her mother’s blood sugar by giving her fruit juice and glucose syrup. He said a lot of other people are not able to keep their heads in such a situation, let alone a child.
“I commend her fast thinking and her levelheadedness,” MacDonald said.
Lones said her daughter is known within their family as the “little nurse” for applying bandages to her grandfather, who is also diabetic. Nevertheless, she was amazed Tehya was able to call 911 as well as give her juice and glucose syrup for her low blood pressure.
As her blood sugar level dropped on Jan. 24, Lones said she became unable to help herself and ultimately passed out. She said her condition would have gotten a lot worse if Tehya had not helped.
“I would have gone into a diabetic coma,” Lones said.
Tehya said she doesn’t know how she knew all the right actions to take that morning, but remembered not being scared at the time.
Asked what she wanted to be when she grows up, Tehya replied, “a nurse.”
Contact Rob Stroud at rstroud@jg-tc.com or 348-5734.
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 (Submitted to the JG/T-C)
Tehya Lones, 5, rides in a Charleston firetruck as part of the fire department’s effort to honor the child for her actions to help rescue her ill mother last month.
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Fxiccxypxc wrote on May 10, 2007 11:31 AM: