Sheriff’s deputies help woman escape overturned tanker truck on fire on Interstate-10 in eastern N.O.

An overturned tanker truck on fire on Interstate-10 in eastern New Orleans on Aug. 26 after its driver was rescued.

Vehicles are backed up on the interstate by the fiery accident.

A burning, overturned tanker truck on Interstate-10, with billowing black smoke rising, quickly drew the attention of nine St. Bernard Parish sheriff’s deputies and reserve officers on their way to a training academy in Slidell in the late afternoon of Aug. 26.

What they saw and heard next: the 24-year-old woman driver screaming hysterically as she tried to escape the truck’s cab, rushed them into action.

The deputies, along with an off-duty New Orleans police officer, were among the first vehicles at the scene after the truck which carried 8,600 gallons of gasoline overturned on the east-bound side of the interstate about 4 p.m.

Four St. Bernard deputies and reserve officers, Richard Scheuermann, Jeremy Roig, Corey Gonzales and Scott Winters ran to the burning truck and the others dealt with traffic on the interstate, keeping vehicles a safe distance away.

Also on the scene from the Sheriff’s Office were Heather Lyons, Shelton Smith, Shane Samaniego, Merlin Flores and Andrew Mowers.

Sheriff James Pohlmann said he was proud of the actions of the officers involved, who remained calm in a pressure situation in order to try to help someone.

“We did a 25-yard dash’’ toward the woman driver who was screaming, said Reserve Division Deputy Gonzales. “She was on the passenger side’’ trying to climb out of the overturned 18-wheeler.

“It was wild,’’ said Jeremy Roig, who works in the Criminal Records Division of the Sheriff’s Office. He said there wasn’t time to hesitate by thinking about whether they would be injured by running toward the fire.

“We were thinking about getting her to safety,’’ Roig said of the driver.

Gonzales said, “We fell back on our training’’ to just react and get her away from the truck, saying “it was a team effort.’’

“It happened so fast,’’ said Scheuermann, who is a corrections officer in St. Bernard Parish Prison. “We were running and I could see her hands (as she was trying to get out) and heard her screaming.’’

When officers got to the driver, Jasmine Henderson, she was climbing out of the cab and the NOPD officer and deputies helped her get off the truck and got her to a safe distance from the blaze. Henderson was treated later at a hospital for minor injuries.

It was just a short period after they all got away that the truck erupted into a heavier fire.

Also, several of the officers said, it wasn’t until after it was over they even realized how hot the fire had been when they saw how much they were sweating.

The officers, who have been training several days a week at the Slidell Regional Police Academy, never made it to class that night because they were on the scene for several hours.