HOUSTON – Forty Houston police officers and three civilians hit the road Wednesday for the annual HPD Bike Relay on a 2,200-mile journey to New York City to raise awareness for a cure for leukemia and lymphoma.
During the team's first leg of the race in Spanish Fort, Alabama, two officers in the team's van spotted a car accident. Officers Mirescha Childs and Brittany Thaler found a 69-year-old man trapped in his car and heard him yell for help.
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"He was letting us know he was trapped and that there was water up to his chest," Childs said.
The rest of the team members, who had been riding behind the van, also stopped to help.
Childs said the man's prosthetic leg had come off and he had been trapped in his car for 30 minutes after falling asleep behind the wheel.
"(It was) only by the grace of God that Brittany and I saw him flicker his lights and we got all riders to stop and called 911," Childs said.
The team members on the first leg were civilian John Houston, retired HPD officers Joe Shockley, David Houston and Earl Thrash, and active HPD officers Mirescha Childs, Brittany Thaler, Rebecca Vargas and Peg Jewell.
This is the 34th year of the HPD Bike Relay. In the past 33 years, officers have ridden more than 73,000 miles and raised more than $5.6 million. The money is used to help find a cures and improve the quality of life for those battling blood-related cancers.
You can follow the HPB Bike Relay updates on department's Twitter, Facebook, and Flickr pages.