Abby’s Angels are Goodyear Highway Heroes

Trucking Headlines
	Abby’s Angels are Goodyear Highway Heroes By Derek Smith Left to right: Richard and Janet Filiczkowski, Marty and Abby Bern, Debbie Virgoe, Ronnie Greene, Rick Tower and Goodyear’s Donn Kramer. Few dry eyes were left in the audience when 9-year-old Abby Bern joined the 2007 Goodyear North American Highway Hero finalists on stage at the Mid-America Trucking Show. Husband-and-wife team drivers Richard and Janet Filiczkowski were accepting the top honor March 27 when Abby, the child they helped save from drowning in an icy South Dakota pond off Interstate 90, made a surprise appearance. Accompanied by her mother, Marty Bern, Abby helped present Richard with the Highway Hero honorary ring. The four embraced and wept. In April 2007, Janet Filiczkowski was driving their C.R. England truck down I-90, about 100 miles west of Sioux Falls, with Richard asleep in the bunk. Janet saw a car veer off the road and into a pond. She called for Richard, and the couple went into action. “I just dove right in because I saw Abby pounding on the car’s back window,” recounted Richard. “My only instinct was to get her out of the car as soon as possible. In situations like that, seconds count.” Also in the vehicle, submerged in about eight feet of water, was Abby’s father, Jeff Bern. Richard was joined in the rescue effort by two other passers-by. The car doors were stuck, but the three were able to open the rear hatch. Abby was freed and brought to the shore, where Janet tended to her while the men worked to free her father. They managed to cut his seat belts, free him from the steering column and bring him ashore, but he did not survive. The Filiczkowskis, nicknamed “Abby’s Angels,” attended Jeff Bern’s funeral at his widow’s invitation. This was the 25th anniversary of Goodyear’s Highway Hero program, which honors truckers who risk their own lives to help others on the road. The other 2007 finalists were: Rick Tower of Yreka, Calif., who rescued an 82-year-old woman from her car, which was sinking in the Klamath River. The late David Virgoe of Innisfil, Ontario, who after swerving his truck to avoid three street-racing cars, sacrificed his own life by veering off the highway rather than into ongoing traffic. His award was accepted by his widow, Debbie. Ronnie Greene of Regina, N.M., who saved a pregnant woman who had been run over by an assailant during a roadside attack. “Richard and Janet Filiczkowski and the three other Highway Hero finalists are all heroes in our book,” said Donn Kramer, director of marketing for Goodyear Commercial Tire Systems. “Their families and friends should find comfort in knowing they helped others without regard for their own lives.”