Rifle resident and local carpet cleaner Alec Larson became a hero on Thursday when he saved a mother and her baby from a fiery car wreck on Highway 82. Larson, who grew up in Carbondale, was on his way to work when he witnessed the aftermath of the collision.
“I was coming past the Cattle Creek Exit heading downvalley toward Glenwood Springs and Carbondale, where a four-runner came through the median,” Larson said. He did not see the crash occur, but was the first one on the scene. “I was the first car there so I pulled over to the side of the road and ran over to see the four-runner and found a woman who was pretty shaken up and helped her get out of the car.”
The wreck involved a four-runner and a Tacoma. Larson found the four-runner’s driver, a mother, visibly shaken and helped her exit the vehicle using a pair of scissors to cut the driver’s seat belt.
“I sat her down and I could see the fire starting underneath the four-runner,” Larson said. “It was fairly small but you could tell it was on its way to become a really serious fire.”
It was then that the mother screamed to Larson that her baby was still inside the car.
Acting swiftly, Larson retrieved the baby through the hatchback of the four-runner just seconds before the vehicle was engulfed in flames.
“I could see the baby sitting behind the driver’s seat and I was able to get him out of the car maybe 20 seconds before the vehicle really caught fire,” he said.
He handed the baby, who was unharmed, to a nurse who had also stopped to help. Meanwhile, the situation with the other vehicle was dire.
“There was a guy in there and both his legs looked completely broken,” Larson said. “He kept saying he couldn’t feel his legs but the fire really started to pick up and stuff started popping so a sheriff, state trooper and myself pulled him out because of the fire.”
Larson, who has experience as a volunteer firefighter and has responded to various natural disasters since he was 17, described his actions as instinctual, especially given his personal history. A father of three, Larson lost one of his daughters in 2020.
“It’s almost second nature,” Larson said. “I lost my daughter to some pretty horrific stuff that I wasn’t able to prevent. Whenever there is a kid involved, there is no thinking that goes on in my mind.”
The mother driving the four-runner was taken into surgery with a concussion, a broken wrist and several broken ribs, according to Larson, who stayed in touch with the family via the family’s nanny, whom Larson attended school with. The condition of the Tacoma’s driver is unknown at this time.