‘You saved somebody’s life today;’ Teens credited with rescuing man from fiery Preble Co. crash

EATON — Family members of a man injured in a Preble County crash late last week are crediting a pair of teens for springing to action and rescuing the man from a burning truck moments before it became fully engulfed in flames.

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The crash happened early Friday morning on state Route 122 near the Eaton city limits, involving a truck driven by Mike Worley. Worley’s truck went off the road and ended up against a tree and power pole and caught fire.

The crash happened in front of the home of Breyden Boston and Preston Orr, a pair of brothers who heard the crash and ran outside to see how they could help.

“All the lights in the house went out. So then me and Breyden, we both ran outside the house, ran over here and then we seen the car flipped and smoking,” Orr told News Center 7′s John Bedell.

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“I mean that was the scariest part was being next to that car that could really blow up any minute... but I heard him asking for help,” Boston said.

The crash trapped Worley inside the wreckage, but the teens, along with their mother and another bystander, worked to cut the air bag. Orr used a knife to cut the air bag then handed the knife to Worley to cut his seatbelt because he couldn’t reach the buckle.

But after cutting himself loose, Worley was still trapped, his foot pinned on the dashboard. The teens, their mother, and the bystander all worked to break the windshield to free Worley.

“Yeah, his name was Larry. He had came up after we kept pulling because I had backed up when I was trying to pull him out the car to look for somebody to help me. And as I looked for somebody, he had started pulling him and he had popped him out with a second tug,” Boston said.

Before medics, police, and deputies had arrived on the scene, Worley had been rescued and pulled from the truck.

“You saved somebody’s life today,” an Eaton police officer told the teens after police arrived on scene, according to body cam footage obtained by News Center 7.

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Preble County Crash on SR 122 Contributed Photo

Worley is now recovering at the burn unit at Miami Valley Hospital from his injuries. His family members said Worley has a long recovery ahead, but that he’s going to be ok.

“(Had the teens not acted) we’d have been planning a funeral is what we’d have been doing,” Robert A Worley, Mike’s brother said.

“I just thank God that those boys were here to get him out of that truck,” Mike’s father Robert E. Worley said.

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The Worley family have called Boston and Orr heroes, but the teens said they don’t want that title.

“I heard him asking for help and I mean there was still time. He was still alive so there was something we could do so we just did what we could and got him out,” Orr said. “We wouldn’t. We couldn’t have (just left him).”

“I said boys you saved my brother’s life. You’re heroes. And that’s just the bottom line. If they hadn’t been here, he’d have been gone,” Robert A. Worley said.

But while the teens downplay their hero title, honors are already being planned for them and the two others that help saved Mike Worley. The Eaton City Council is working on an honor for the four during one of their upcoming meetings.

Eaton Community Schools Superintendent Jeff Parker confirmed the teens were students in the district, with Boston just graduating last month and Orr entering his sophomore year when school resumes in the fall.

“Eaton Community Schools is extremely proud of the actions Breyden and Preston took last Friday. These young men are heroes in every sense of the word. They not only saved a life, they impacted the lives of the loved ones whose life they saved. The significance of the actions they took in those few seconds, minutes will have be felt for years, decades to come,” Parker said in a statement to News Center 7.

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