Question: What do members of the Rockdale Volunteer Fire Department do when they’re off duty.
Answer: Members of the Rockdale Volunteer Fire Department are never off duty.
Fire Chief Ward Rod-dam said last week a package arrived for him at the fire station bearing some special items.
One of them was a T-shirt which would have been described as “tongue in cheek” if its message hadn’t been so serious. And heart-felt.
On the front it said: “I saved Melanie’s life”; on the back: “And all I got was this crappy shirt.”
It’s true. Over the Memorial Day weekend Roddam performed CPR on a drowning woman in the Gulf of Mexico at Port Aransas, the wife of a San Antonio policeman.
Roddam said he believed he was the right place at in the right time. He and wife Kathryne were camping on the beach and chose a spot which, by chance, was next to the vacationing couple.
That night the policeman signaled for help as is wife had gotten in trouble in the water.
Together the men pulled the woman to shore and Kathryne Roddam called 911 and used the chief’s red/blue flashing traffic control to guide emergency crews to the location.
Roddam said the woman was not breathing and had no pulse. He initiated CPR. After 10 minutes she inhaled deeply, threw up water and began to breathe.
She stopped breathing briefly but the chief was able to revive her again. After sustaining a seizure she was transported and treated.
She recovered and returned to the couple’s beach camp the next day.
Roddam doesn’t believe the incident happened by chance.
“I firmly believe God puts us in places we need to be,” he said. “ I know he guided us to that specific camp spot along miles of beach.”
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