Not all superheroes wear capes.
Tyra Winters, a Rockwall, Texas high school cheerleader, saved the life of a little boy who was choking on the sidelines during the homecoming parade.
Winters was sitting atop a homecoming float waving to the crowd when she noticed the toddler choking on a piece of candy.
“He was turning purple, so I immediately jumped off the float, I ran down to the kiddo, and I was like, ‘I got him’ and I grabbed him from the mom. I grabbed him and tilted him and I gave a good three back thrusts and he ended up spitting up,” Winters told CBS DFW.
The child’s mother, Nicole Hornback, said that the Rockwall High Senior saved her son Clarke’s life.
“I was sitting right next to him, I just happened to look over. There was no noise, no coughing, no breathing,” Hornback said. That’s when Winters came to the rescue.
“She saved my baby. I commend her for being a teenager and being trained,” Hornback said.
After Winters saved Clarke, she did what any teenager would do and ran to get “back on the float before [she] missed it, she told NBC DFW. Hornback said she never had the opportunity to properly say thank you so she wrote a message on Facebook about what happened, thanking the 17-year-old for saving her son’s life. School administrators saw the note and arranged for the two to meet at the school.
Clarke and Winters greeted with a high five and Hornback said that she really didn’t have the words to properly express her immense gratitude.
“The words that you would say to anyone who does something for you is ‘thank you.’ But that doesn’t seem good enough,” Hornback said.
Winters wants to be a pediatric surgeon and was trained in CPR and the Heimlich maneuver at her mother’s group home for foster children. Despite all of the praise she’s receiving, she said she really was just trying to help.
“I know they’re calling me the town hero,” Winters said. “It’s super exciting to own that title. But most importantly, I’m just glad the boy is OK.”
A round of applause for this real life hero and future doctor.
Photo Courtesy of Rockwall ISD/Facebook