Brooklyn Councilman Pulls Woman From Wrecked Van

SHEEPSHEAD BAY, BROOKLYN — A Sheepshead Bay city councilman aided an elderly woman after a van taking her to a day care center crashed Friday morning.

Councilman Chaim Deutsch said he was headed to his office from a breakfast at Kingsborough Community College when he saw the Atlantic Adult Day Care van hit another car around 10:41 a.m. on Emmons Avenue near East 15th Street in Sheepshead Bay.

Deutsch called 911, then went up to the driver's door and saw the air bag inflated and the van full of smoke, he said. He helped pull out the driver, who was "in a daze" from the crash, he said.

"The whole inside of the van was full of smoke so I thought the whole thing was going to light on fire," Deutsch said.

The smoke turned out to be from the air bag, Deutsch said, but he didn't want to risk being wrong. He got the woman out of the van, brought her to his car and waited for FDNY firefighters to arrive, he said.

The woman hurt her leg and wrist, Deutsch said, but both she and the driver refused medical attention. No one else was in the van, he said.

"Usually when there’s an accident you don’t want to move the patients, but with all the smoke you don’t want — god forbid if something explodes," Deutsch said.

A photo from the scene posted to Twitter shows Deutsch, a Democrat, dressed in a shirt and tie, helping the woman from the van. The white BMW the van seemingly hit is seen with part of its back bumper missing.

This wasn't Deutsch's first rescue. More than two decades ago he founded Flatbush Shomrim, a neighborhood safety patrol that was among the first groups to respond after Superstorm Sandy hit South Brooklyn, Deutsch said.

"I always spring into action," he said.

(Lead image: Photo courtesy of Motty Brauner via Twitter)