Texas employee honored for saving infant’s life

(Story by Andy Heines Jr.)

McALLEN, Texas — If you ask Ramiro Martinez about the lifesaving actions that took place on an October day in this Texas city, he will say it was something that most other people would have done.

But if you ask the mother of the one-year-old child who was choking from a penny lodged in his throat, she would say Martinez is a hero.

Martinez was recently awarded the AEP Certificate of Honor and the AEP Texas Outstanding Citizen Award by AEP Texas President and Chief Operating Officer Wade Smith and Distribution Operations Vice President David Hooper, along with other members of the AEP Texas leadership team.

From left: Weldon Jones, McAllen Supervisor of Distribution Systems; Wade Smith, AEP Texas President and Chief Operating Officer; Ramiro Martinez, McAllen Line Mechanic A; and David Hooper, Vice President of Distribution Operations.

“I’ve known Ram since he started 15 years ago,” said Weldon Jones, McAllen supervisor of Distribution Systems. “He’s a stand-up guy and what he did shows it. It was a very stressful time, he kept his cool and he reacted as I hope that I would.”

On October 12, Martinez, a line mechanic A, and Troy Eads, a service mechanic A, were performing a tailboard safety check in McAllen when a woman holding her infant approached them, frantically asking for their help. The infant was choking and turning blue.

Martinez said he took the child, placed him over his knee and patted him firmly on the back three times. The child was still choking, so Martinez repeated the maneuver and was able to dislodge the penny.

“I really did not have time to think,” he said. “Instinct and fatherhood took over and my training kicked in.” Martinez and his co-workers had taken a CPR, AED and first aid refresher course only a week before the incident.

Emergency medical technicians who arrived on the scene credited his actions for most likely saving the child’s life.

Martinez recently took the child a stuffed animal as a Christmas gift and said the infant is doing just fine.

“I think he is a hero for what he did,” Jones said. “You ask him and he doesn’t consider himself one. He used his training the company provides and it was very beneficial.”