Tim Martin and Mike Wilson have something else in common besides being Members of a Labor Union - both recently and literally sprang into action to help their fellow Western New Yorkers in yet another example of Union Workers doing the right thing when the need arises.

WNYLaborToday.com recently learned what Martin, a Member of National Association of Letter Carriers (NALC) Branch 3 (pictured above, on the left), and Wilson, a Member of International Union of Operating Engineers (IUOE) Local 17 (pictured above, on the right), did on their own volution while on-the-job that has made a difference in the lives of two women.

And, WNYLaborToday.com is honored to report what these two fine Union Members did, starting with Martin on New Year’s Eve Day in December 2022.

Martin, 42, who’s been a Member of Branch 3 for nearly 10 years, was delivering mail in a trailer park in Hamburg when he saw a car parked in a driveway that had erupted in flames.

He knew the owner of the house was a 65-year-old woman with a mild disability, whom he’d gotten to know over the course of time when dropping off packages at her home.

Some neighbors were attempting to put the car fire out, but within just 30 seconds, Martin tells WNYLaborToday.com the flames grew with the intensity of the blaze beginning to impact the trailer home.

While this was all going on, there were some neighbors recording the fire on their cell phones while Martin asked if the owner of the home was still inside.

They answered, “yes,” but kept on videoing the scene.

“Those trailers ‘go up really fast and nobody was helping’ this older woman who lived there,” Martin recounted to WNYLaborToday.com.

Martin immediately knew what he had to do.

He ran around the trailer home to a back door as the fire was literally “melting” the side of the trailer. 

There he found the door had been secured from the inside by bungees, so Martin - “a skinny guy,” was able to squeeze through and get inside where he found the woman.

“I told her, ‘C’mon we need to get you out,’” he said.

She grabbed a couple of personal items and her dog and they began to make their way to the back door of the trailer home, but the woman quickly found herself out of breath after taking just four to five step.

She said she “had to take a break,” Martin said. “I told her, ‘Listen honey you can take as many breaks as you want once we get out,” recounting that heavy smoke was now entering into her home.

When he finally got her outside to safety, Martin said he could see the front of the trailer home had caught on fire.

After Firefighters got to the scene and got the fire under control, Martin said the woman was “very thankful that I came to help her.”

What still puzzles Martin is that he can’t figure out why some of the neighbors kept videoing the scene instead of acting and trying to help the owner: “It was ‘really odd that they weren’t helping.’  ‘In the world we live in, I guess they felt instead of helping they were okay with filming.’”

“It ‘all happened so fast,’” Martin continued. “I had ‘really never been in a situation like that before.’  ‘She needed help to get out and I didn’t want her to get hurt.’  There was a lot of damage to her home.”

Martin, a married Father of four, said he was “proud that I did the right thing.”

“I got her out to safety and ‘didn’t think about putting myself in that kind of (dangerous) situation.’  The car that was burning ‘was blocking the front of the trailer and the front door.’  ‘I was just there at the right time to help, it’s crazy to think about it,” he said.

Word spread quickly about what Martin had done at his home Post Office and throughout Branch 3.  But he had no idea of the praise he would receive for his good deed, including a supervisor presenting him with cape, ala Superman, with a diamond-shaped Postal logo on the back.

“I ‘love my job and I love being a Mail Carrier and I wouldn’t want to do anything else.’  After this incident, I like to tell people: ‘I deliver bills and save lives,’” Martin said with a laugh.  “The cape ‘was amazing and I’m so happy they gave it to me.’”

NALC Branch 3 President David Grosskopf told WNYLaborToday.com his immediate reaction to learning what Martin had done was: “It was ‘pretty heroic,’ based on the video of the engulfed care in flames in front of that home.”

“But ‘time and time again, it’s Letter Carriers who keep an eye on our community.’  ‘He saw it happen, called for others to help and got (the woman) out.’  ‘It makes me proud of our Unionized Letter Carriers out there - helping our communities.’  ‘They don’t turn a blind eye when they see something - they get involved.’”

Meanwhile, Wilson - a IUOE Local 17 Crane Oiler working on the massive Great Lakes Cheese Project in the Cattaraugus County Town of Franklinville, was driving down a back road past a church as he was heading back to the jobsite from taking a coffee break on a very cold morning last week when he saw an elderly woman, in mid fall, hit a paved sidewalk - face first.

Wilson, who’s from Salamanca and had been an Ambulance Technician for 10 years, immediately slammed his car in park and went to the aid of the woman, who he believed was in her mid-to-late 70s.

She’d slipped on the icy sidewalk due to an overnight flash freeze in the Southern Tier.

Other than Wilson, there was no one else around when the accident happened.

“All I could think was, ‘Oh, no,’” Wilson, a third-year Apprentice told WNYLaborToday.com.  “When I reached her, ‘there was a lot of blood.’  ‘I felt terrible for her.’  ‘She was in pain and screaming, yelling.’  ‘She was moaning a lot.’  She’d ‘broken her nose and her eye socket was broken.’  Then my (medical and Union safety) training ‘kicked in.’  ‘I made her as comfortable as I could and put pressure on her nose to try to stop the bleeding, then I called (9-1-1).’  ‘I kept talking to her to try to calm her.’  My gloves were ‘soaked with blood’.  An ambulance and the police showed up.  She was taken to Olean General Hospital.  ‘I hope she’s okay.’”

The time Wilson spent with the woman, whose name he still does not know, was less than 15 minutes - but he’s happy the training he received was put to good use.

“It ‘really helped out,’” he said.

Wilson, whose wife and three children are “proud” of what he did, said he felt good helping someone in need: “I ‘walked away smiling because I could help somebody.’”

Local 17 Business Manager Gary Swain (pictured above, on the left, with Wilson) called Wilson’s reaction and afforded assistance “a ‘testament to the Union and family way of life.’”

“Union Members ‘are always willing to help when anything like this happens.’  What Mike did that day ‘is what any good citizen would do and thank God he received the training our Union offers, which is offered to any of our Members who are willing to take the time.’  ‘It all paid off,’” Swain said. 

“I’m ‘proud’ of what Mike did, ‘as I am of any of our Members who do something good, because they care.’  ‘I’m proud of all of them doing the right thing,” he said.

WNYLaborToday.com Editor's Note: Photos of Tim Martin that appear with this Labor News Report are courtesy of NALC Branch 3.  The photo of IUOE Business Manager Gary Swain and Mike Wilson were taken by WNYLaborToday.com.