Family thanks good Samaritans
"I owe them my life," Amira Jakupovic says of the passers-by who saved her younger son from drowning.
By RICK GERSHMAN
Published November 7, 2005
TAMPA - Amira Jakupovic searched for words to express her gratitude to the people who jumped from the Howard Frankland Bridge on Saturday to keep her son alive.
"I owe them my life," she said Sunday. "I would give them my life, because they saved my son's life."
Her son Amar, a second-grader at St. Petersburg's Rio Vista Elementary, was in serious condition Sunday at Tampa General Hospital. But he has improved, his mother said, and she thinks it is likely he will recover fully.
The boy was trapped in the family car after it blew a tire and flipped over the guardrail into 9 feet of water. The three other family members got safely out of the car, but Amar, the youngest, was trapped inside.
That's when passer-by Kerry Reardon jumped into Tampa Bay and pulled him from the Ford Explorer.
Reardon swam with the boy to a fishing boat piloted by Tampa resident Kenny Hyatt, who had picked up the other three family members.
Amar, 7, was unconscious and his pulse was weak. But registered nurse Kelli Earle, 25, who also had jumped from the bridge to help, gave Amar CPR aboard the boat.
On Sunday, Amira Jakupovic, 31, sat beside her husband's bed at Tampa General Hospital and spoke with reporters about the accident and the rescue.
As she talked about the rescuers, tears welled in the eyes of her husband, Mujo. And Amira Jakupovic's voice broke.
Amira Jakupovic and her older son, Emrah, 13, are banged up but okay, she said. Mujo Jakupovic, 34, has a gash in his leg that goes to the bone, but after surgery he should be all right, she said.
The Jakupovic (pronounced yock-uh-POE-vich) family came to the United States from Bosnia six years ago. Mujo Jakupovic works for a termite control company, and his wife is a homemaker.
Amira Jakupovic's parents have a home in Tampa, where the family was headed for lunch when the accident occurred, she said.
Saturday had been picture-perfect: The traffic was light, and the sky was bright and clear. It was about 1 p.m., and Amira Jakupovic was driving.
As the 1998 Ford Explorer neared the bridge's end, its left rear tire blew out, and the SUV slammed into the guard wall. It bounced across four lanes and flipped off the bridge, plunging about 14 feet.
Everyone in the car was wearing seat belts, Amira Jakupovic said. She, her husband and Emrah quickly escaped, but they soon realized Amar had not.
Reardon, 43, a St. Petersburg native, happened upon the scene, dove in and pulled Amar out of the vehicle.
"He was just sitting there like a little rag doll," Reardon said Saturday. "I unbuckled him, pulled him out of the car and gave him his first breath of life."
When they emerged, Amira Jakupovic said, she was both relieved and terrified, since Amir was "so blue."
However, she said, he's tough enough to recover: "He's really strong."
--Rick Gershman can be reached at rgershman@sptimes.com or 813 226-3431.