HARRIS COUNTY, Texas – A father of four who tried to help tow his mother’s car earlier this month nearly lost his life after getting pinned between two vehicles in the Katy area.
It happened Dec. 7 near the intersection of Greenhouse Road and West Little York Road.
“I’m just so grateful that I’m still here and I consider myself lucky and blessed,” the victim Luis Santana said.
He rushed to the area from the gym to help his mother after she broke down that night, he said.
As the 36-year-old active father of four strapped the back of his truck to her front bumper to tow away the vehicle, he said he heard a loud noise, which was another car smacking into the back of hers. He got pinned between his truck and her SUV.
“I felt just a big pain in my legs and it kind of like, gave me like a shock,” Santana said. “When I took the second step, that’s when I knew I was in trouble. I had already lost my leg on impact and I fell to the ground.”
He said he felt the pain almost immediately. Photos of her SUV appear to show the dented bumper right in the area he got stuck.
“From my waist down, I was just so, so, so weak. I had no control whatsoever,” he said. “I remember telling the ambulance people, ‘Please don’t let me die.’”
Blood gushed through the road, he said, and a good Samaritan turned a t-shirt into a tourniquet.
“God was in my mind the whole time, and my kids, and I told them to please save me,” Santana said.
Medics rushed him to the hospital where he underwent three surgeries during a 10-day stay.
He doesn’t have his right leg anymore and said he can barely feel his toes on his left leg.
“I’m still in a lot of pain,” he said.
He’ll be using a wheelchair for the time being and will need a prosthetic leg in the future. He’ll also need a fourth surgery, he said.
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The setback hasn’t stopped his optimistic outlook and he said he’s grateful his mom wasn’t the one hurt.
“Now my nickname, I like to call myself, ‘Second Chance aka strongest man alive’,” he said. “I will walk again. And I will be the man that I was before.”
The Harris County Sheriff’s Office told KPRC 2 an investigation into the crash has been closed. The driver, who wasn’t found to be speeding nor impaired, isn’t likely to face criminal charges, as the disabled car was in a moving lane of traffic and the road was dark.