Arlington police and firefighters responded to a fiery single-vehicle crash early Saturday morning along I-30 in Arlington involving a suspected drunk driver.
Strangers pulled the driver, identified by police as 25-year-old Zack Sprinkle, from his burning car.
One of the good Samaritans who stopped to help captured the dramatic rescue on his cell phone.
Eric Snorden was just trying to get home at around 4 a.m.
“I had just got off work,” he said. “I work at FedEx Freight.”
Snorden found himself stopping at the crash scene and making a split-second decision.
“I was like just, I don’t know, it’s like something took over me and I just went for it.”
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In the approximately five minute cell phone video you can hear Snorden and another good Samaritan screaming at the driver, ‘you got to get him out of the car, bro! The car’s on fire!”
Together, Snorden and the man pulled the driver out of the car just as the flames crept closer.
The man moaned in pain as the two strangers pulled him from the car, then pulled his body again as the flames grew larger.
In the video the men ask the driver, “You drunk, bro? Were you drinking?”
The driver is heard responding ‘yes.’
“He was like ‘yeah, I was drinking,’” said Snorden. “When he told me that, it was heartbreaking. It was like Oh my god, this is the consequence.”
The sobering statistic is that about one in three traffic deaths in the U.S. involve a drunk driver, according to the CDC.
“What if he hit a child or a family just driving home or something like that? It’s just not worth it,” said Snorden.
Arlington police say Sprinkle is lucky to be alive.
The 25-year-old is being treated at a local hospital and is charged with driving while intoxicated.
Snorden refuses to be called a hero, but hopes everyone listens to his advice.
“Just think before you do it, because next time someone might not be there to pull you from that,” he said.
