A postal worker’s quick resolution to use his belt as a bandage helped a man who had severely cut his arm with a chainsaw.
Fernando Garcia, a US Postal Service letter carrier made a heroic effort to stop a man’s arm from severe bleeding after he accidentally cut himself with a chainsaw in Norwalk, California, the Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Department’s Norwalk Station said in a Twitter post.
Garcia was on his daily route in Norwalk on Friday when heard the man’s family’s calling for help, the police said.
“When he turned around, I saw that he was holding his left arm. And he was just covered in blood,” Garcia said in KCAL.
Garcia quickly looped his belt around the man’s bleeding arm, wrapping it as tightly as he could and held it there. He got the idea to use his belt as a tourniquet from the movies.
The USPS worker had to throw away his belt as there was blood on it. After the man was taken to the hospital, Garcia purchased a new shirt and belt and continued on his mail route, KCAL reported.
The sheriff’s department praised Garcia as an “everyday hero” in its tweet, with several community members commenting on their support for the mail carrier’s brave actions.
In a CNN report, the family of the injured man said he was released from the hospital on Sunday. According to his niece, Kelsey Cabral, he is starting to regain movement in his hand.
“We are very proud of letter carrier Fernando Garcia and thankful for his swift, heroic action in helping a customer in dire need of assistance,” according to a Postal Service statement. “Our postal carriers truly are the eyes and ears in the community.”