Friday, April 25, 1997
Comanche man burned
By ROY A. JONES II
Senior Staff Writer
COMANCHE - A longtime Comanche County employee might not be
alive today if his 9-year-old grandson hadn't been handy.
Don Melot, 65, was listed in stable condition in Hendrick Medical
Center in Abilene on Thursday, six days after he was seriously
burned in an accident at his home six miles east of here.
Aided by his grandson, Corbin Grayson, Melot had been burning
some brush in a shallow pit on his farm about 4:30 p.m. Saturday.
He was throwing a large limb into the fire when he lost his balance
and fell in, his wife, Viann, said.
Melot was able to scramble out of the pit unaided, but he received
third-degree burns on both hands and arms, his face and one ear,
and second-degree burns on his knees.
"Fortunately he was wearing a new denim uniform and his
clothes didn't catch on fire," Mrs. Melot said Thursday at
Hendrick. The pants kept his knees from being burned as deeply
as his hands and arms.
"Corbin heard his pa holler and saw him climbing out of
the fire. He ran right to the house and called me at work. My
husband wouldn't have been able to dial the telephone his hands
hurt so bad and there's no telling how long it would have taken
him to get help otherwise," she said.
"When I got there Corbin was putting some aloe vera on
the burns and telling his pa he'd be all right. He was our little
hero," she said.
Melot received emergency treatment at Comanche Community Hospital,
then was airlifted by FirstFlight helicopter to Hendrick. It may
have marked the first time a victim's family beat the helicopter
to the hospital from so far away.
"Our son, Mike, is a pilot," Mrs. Corbin explained.
"He flew me to the Abilene airport; some nice folks there
loaned us a courtesy car and we got to Hendrick just before the
helicopter landed."
By coincidence, the Hendrick security guard who met the arriving
flight, Vicky Pyburn, is a niece of the burn victim. She had not
known who the helicopter was bringing to Hendrick.
Corbin is the son of Steve and Donna Melot Grayson and is a
fourth-grader at Comanche Elementary School.
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Abilene Reporter-News / Texnews / E.W. Scripps Publications
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