Miss. Firefighter Recovering After Being Pinned Against Wall

A Gulfport firefighter is on the road to recovery after being pinned against the wall of his fire station by a fire apparatus.

“I’m taking it day by day,” Mark Headrick told WBRC. “Waiting for this to heal.”

He tried to warn the driver of the apparatus as it was about to hit the wall of Station 5 on Feb. 13.

“I didn’t even think where the truck was, or where the wall was,” he said. “I just knew in an instant, my head was getting crushed against the wall.”

“I was saying, 'What the heck? What’s going on?' You know, get the truck off my head,” Headrick said. “And finally, the truck pulled over and I just went over there and stumbled to the ground. I never dreamed that anything like this would have happened. I thought I would have gotten hurt in a fire.”

He underwent over five hours of surgery to repair his broken jaw. He also suffered shoulder and head injuries.

On his journey home from the hospital, he said firefighters stood at the side of the road to salute him.

“We always hear that we are a tight-knit family,” Headrick said. “And this proves that we are.”