One person’s life was saved by a group of truckers over the weekend after the suicidal man climbed onto a highway sign along an overpass and jumped, only for his fall to be broken by three parked tractor trailers.
The incident happened at around 9:30 a.m. on Saturday morning, July 7th in Greenville, South Carolina.
According to Fox Carolina, police were called when a passerby noticed 38-year-old Vernon Seigler standing at the edge of the Highway 25 overpass, threatening to jump down onto Interstate 85 in an attempt to kill himself.
A southbound portion of I-85 was then quickly shut down as SWAT team members attempted to convince Seigler off the overpass, but the man wouldn’t budge, and that’s where the three truck drivers came in.
The three big rigs parked themselves beneath Siegler’s perch, creating a platform and reducing the man’s fall to only a few feet when he did eventually jump from the overpass, allowing him to slide down the side of a tanker truck and onto I-85.
“At some point during the negotiations, the subject did jump from the I-85 sign that he was laying on, and landed on a truck,” said Sergeant Ryan Flood.
Because of the help given by those three unnamed truck drivers, Seigler suffered only minor injuries and was taken into police custody.
He was later charged with disorderly conduct and pedestrian in the roadway.