Through the flames
Milan man saves self, others by actions after explosion

Wayne Smalley has lost everything but his spirit. In July, a propane explosion blew him threw a wall in his trailer. He ran into the flames, shutting off the propane and preventing harm to his neighbors homes, but the fire that swept through his home also consumed his body. — © 2009 Gallup Independent / Adron Gardner

Copyright © 2009
Gallup Independent
By Jim Tiffin
Cibola County Bureau

GRANTS — Imagine you have lost your driver’s license; birth certificate; $450 in cash; all your tools, which you use for your job; all your family photos and mementos; your home; your car; your cell phone — literally everything you had to work and live — and by the way, you also have second- and third-degree burns over 40 percent of your body.

Your arms are burned from your fingertips to your shoulder. Your right shoulder was impaled by three large metal screws when a piece of the mobile home you were living in fell and hit you while lying on the ground.

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