A North Charleston police officer who seems to have a knack for being in the right place at the right time is sharing his story of helping save a toddler who fell from a moving car last week and severed her arm.
Officer Jason Marzan, a father of six, says he’d always prepared himself “to come across a situation like this” when he heard a child was in trouble Tuesday morning near the I-26 University Boulevard exit ramp. He was just up the road at Trident Medical Center.
Marzan says he immediately spotted the 2-year-old girl in the road and was grateful a soldier from Shaw Airforce Base had managed to park her car so no other vehicles would hit the child. Then, he says, 21 years of experience in the Army kicked in.
“Do what’s first. Do what’s best,” he thought.
Marzan saw the girl was missing her arm and quickly grabbed his tourniquet kit to stop the bleeding. He says he spotted the severed limb just a few feet away. It was recovered as EMS arrived and rushed the toddler to the MUSC’s Shawn Jenkins Hospital in Charleston.
But the officer couldn’t stop thinking about the little girl. So, he visited her in the hospital as soon as he could and was surprised by what he found the next day.
“Not only did the baby live, the hospital was able to reattach her arm,” says Marzan. “She’s starting to get sensation back into her fingers.”
“It’s a miracle that they can do that.”
It’s not the first time Marzan, on the force for four years, has helped save a life. He says he just happened to be getting gas about a year ago on Aviation Avenue in North Charleston when a head-on collision occurred nearby, and an unconscious man was trapped in a burning vehicle. Marzan pulled the pinned man to safety.
“This is probably one of the best things about wearing the badge,” says Marzan.
Marzan says he's worked as an officer for just five years, first in New York before moving to the Lowcountry. Saving lives, he says, “makes me want to go another 20 years.”
