OAKLAND, CA (September 28, 2007) - Television photojournalist Jim Foster was driving on his way to work at the Oakland bureau of KNTV NBC11 on Thursday when he came upon an eight car pile-up on Interstate 880 in Union City, CA. He saw that there were multiple injuries but as he started to get his camera gear out he saw one car in particular, and it was upside down. He saw an elderly gentleman trying to help two women, and there was a young girl who was lying upside-down in the roof of the overturned car. She looked to be about 12 years old, Foster said, and her right arm was severed.
"It's the kind of thing that keeps playing over and over in your head," Foster told News Photographer magazine today. He didn't start shooting video, but instead went to the girl and kneeled down with her and held her hand. comforting her, while they waited for help. "She kept saying, 'My arm hurts, my arm hurts,' and you look down and there's no arm ..."
Facing the choice between being a Good Samaritan and shooting, Foster decided to assist the child. He stayed with the girl, who was one of three occupants injured in that vehicle, until EMTs arrived. Foster said that one of the other women, possibly the girl's mother, was unconscious. When medics took over, he stepped back. "Then I did what we do: I got my gear out and started shooting."
Foster noticed that when they loaded the girl into an ambulance, destined for Children's Hospital and Research Center in Oakland, the right side of her body was braced with "some kind of a box," but he didn't see her arm.
Doctors at Children's Hospital and Research Center this afternoon confirmed they were able to reattach the girl's arm during surgery overnight Thursday. They also confirmed that the girl's mother and father were injured in the crash, NBC11 News reports. The hospital has not released the names of the girl or her parents, citing HIPAA regulations.
California Highway Patrol officers said the accident happened when police were trying to make a traffic stop for an HOV lane violator. When police were chasing the fleeing driver, "The guy apparently exited at the Alvarado Niles Canyon Road exit and then came flying back onto the freeway and plowed over four or five lanes, hitting cars," Foster said. The car with the injured girl that Foster helped had been in front of the fleeing driver. "It looks like he tagged them and caused them to flip."
CHP says the suspect's car also flipped over but that he was not seriously injured, and he was being stopped for driving while alone in a HOV lane of the freeway. The driver also had a suspended license, and the SUV involved in the crash was stolen.
After delivering his video, Foster's bosses at KNTV NBC11 told him to take the rest of the day off. "I actually went over to CHP and got a bite to eat with them, and then I went home and took my wife out to dinner." The photojournalist was relieved to hear the news this afternoon when the station called to say they'd heard from authorities that doctors were successful in their attempt to reattach the girl's arm. "I was surprised there wasn't more about it in the news, but it's the kind of thing we could have missed too if I didn't just happen to drive up on it at the time."
