A Texas firefighter injured when he was hit by a pickup truck driven by a fellow firefighter has died.
Steven Henderson, 60, was one of three firefighters from the Louise Volunteer Fire Department involved in the Oct. 7 accident while returning from a call, KTRK-TV reports. He underwent surgery for his injuries following the incident but died Saturday.
"I asked (Henderson) if there's anything he wanted to tell the department before I left, and he said 'Yeah, tell everybody I say hi.' That was the last thing I spoke to him about," Louise Fire Chief Tommy Johnston told KTRK.
According to the fire department, Henderson and another firefighter were on their way back from a fire call near Louise just before 9 p.m. when they stopped their apparatus along the highway in order to inspect "the front tires because they thought something was wrong." Another firefighter, who was leaving the same fire scene in his personal pickup truck, did not see the stopped apparatus and struck his colleagues while they were outside their vehicle.
Henderson was airlifted to a hospital in Houston, and his partner was taken by ambulance to a hospital in Richmond with non-life threatening injuries, the department said. The firefighter driving the pickup wasn't hurt.
Authorities at the crash scene said that while the apparatus' headlights were on, the vehicle's emergency lights were not. Johnston told KTRK that the firefighter in the pickup said he couldn't see Henderson or his partner standing outside the vehicle, and police are not charging him in the accident.
Henderson, who worked as the drainage foreman for the Wharton County Drainage District, is survived by his wife, a daughter and a stepson, according to his obituary.
The other injured firefighter was released from the hospital after several days, KTRK added.
