He fought desperately in the Jingguang North Road Tunnel
Many things of Yuan Gebing disappeared in the heavy rain in Zhengzhou.
On July 20, near the Jingguang North Road tunnel, his ID card, bank card and many belongings were washed away.
The phone didn't know which corner of the city he had drifted to, so that by the 25th, his sense of time was chaotic.
On that long and flustered rainy day, the welder from Shiyan, Hubei soaked in the water of the Jingguang North Road Tunnel for 16 hours. He only ate a few mouthfuls of steamed buns, but saved more than 50 people.
He had a serious illness, and the doctor told him not to do too heavy work, not to stay up late, and not to catch a cold, but he took everything that night.
In the past two days, because of being soaked in the water for too long, the rheumatism has been committed again, and the two cuts in the feet that were made during the rescue have also begun to rot and discharge.
He didn't have money for infusions, so he took some anti-inflammatory drugs casually.
On the day of the rescue, he returned to the dormitory on the construction site. Yuan Gebing said he had rescued him, but his roommate did not believe it.
"Actually, I went out to play." He joked off the subject.
Only the brother believed him.
On the evening of the 23rd, he borrowed his mobile phone to call his brother to report safety and told his brother that he was saving lives in Zhengzhou.
The older brother knew that his younger brother was enthusiastic, so he smiled and said, "Then you go quickly."
On the afternoon of July 26, the Henan Provincial Government’s flood prevention and disaster relief press conference notified that as of 12 noon on the 26th, 6 victims were found at the scene of the Jingguang North Road Tunnel.
Many witnesses of the trapped tunnel recalled that there was congestion at the south entrance of the tunnel at three or four o'clock in the afternoon, and the water surged up suddenly after five o'clock. It took less than 10 minutes from the ankle to the roof of the car. People who hadn't had time to abandon the car were washed into the water.
That day, Yuan Gebing's construction site was suspended due to heavy rain. When he came out to wander around, he ran into people trapped in the street.
He saw that the Jingguang North Road tunnel was "full", he could no longer see the tunnel, and he didn't know what was going on.
He only knows that "you will save you if you see someone."
He suffers from rheumatism and his knees are more sensitive to the weather than his skin.
Prior to this, he had been in Beijing for 10 years of subway repairs, and only came to Zhengzhou in March this year. He joined the construction team of the China Railway First Bureau to participate in the construction of Metro Line 10 and Line 7.
The first time he came to Zhengzhou, he felt that "the climate is good, warm, dry and wet", and the cost of living is much lower than in Beijing.
He is going to move to Zhengzhou to find a wife here, and it is best to save money to buy a suite.
The rain was unexpected to him.
As of July 20, Zhengzhou had rained for 4 days.
At noon that day, he first rode a bicycle to the intersection of Longhai Road and Jingguang Road, and saw "a pot of porridge" under the Longhai Viaduct.
"The road is relatively wide, and the cars are jamming one by one." He decided to help, standing at the intersection and helping to evacuate the vehicles coming in from multiple forks and let them leave in an orderly manner.
Around 2 o'clock in the afternoon, the water under his feet began to soar.
"It's raining white smoke."
As the stagnant water got deeper and deeper, he explored a relatively smooth road, guiding pedestrians who were too late to leave to hide in the taller buildings, "I told them that it is safe to follow me, and you can go wherever I go."
The water quickly reached his thighs, and he saw people starting to be washed away by the water in the low-lying part of the road 2 meters away.
"I can't hear anything." Yuan Gebing's ears were filled with rain, and his eyes were fascinated by rain. He vaguely saw someone holding a tree, someone holding a railing, and someone climbing on a signal light. "It was too messy at the time, I was blindfolded. "There is only one thought in his mind: swim to them quickly.
Yuan Gebing grew up by the river, and the Huanglong Dam at the foot of the village emits water every summer.
Everyone in the village knew that he was good at water, and when someone fell into the water, the villagers would knock on his door.
Like at home, in this somewhat unfamiliar city, Yuan Gebing began to save people non-stop.
Unlike at home, when the riverside water level rises to a certain position, villagers generally do not walk toward the riverside.
But the people here are new to the flood.
When Yuan Gebing rescued people, some people stood in the flower bed and did not want to leave. "He hasn't experienced it. He thought the water would disappear soon."
Some people are afraid that Yuan Gebing is unprofessional and dare not follow him.
An aunt didn’t believe him at first, but later came to see him to save a lot of people, her attitude changed, and she asked, “How old is the young man? Have you gotten married?” Knowing that Yuan Gebing is single, she wants to take her sister’s family The daughter introduced it to Yuan Gebing.
"I just drank a sip of water at the time." Yuan Gebing felt he wanted to laugh and cry, and accidentally choked on his saliva.
Yuan Gebing, 30, is an honest man.
When talking about girlfriends before, the other party said that the family needs money because of difficulties at home. If he only had 523.5 yuan, he would transfer 523 yuan to the other party; a worker on the construction site borrowed him for one month's living expenses. A few months later, he called and answered "I In Korea, you come to me", he is not angry.
He always trusts others unconditionally and does not know how to face the distrust of others.
When saving someone, he came across someone who couldn't say anything, so he could only save the next one first.
Where the water is shallow, he can pull people directly ashore.
Where the water was deep, he picked up a foam board, let people put it on the board, and then slowly pushed it to a safe place.
He can't remember how many times he dragged the foam board back and forth.
There was a sudden cramp in his leg in the middle. After sitting on the side of the road for less than a minute to rest, he plunged into the water again.
If he wanted to take a breath, he stepped on the water and rested in the water.
"It's not just me who is saving people." Yuan Gebing said.
Someone swam over to help him when he was exhausted, and someone handed him a rope from the shore.
He saw a fat man supporting a man on the shelf, but he was too weak and waved his arms to ask him for help.
After Yuan Gebing sent the rescued ashore, he wanted to come back and rescue the man.
"But he said he didn't need to save him, he just had to rest for a while, and let me save others as soon as possible." Yuan Gebing watched the man swim back safely before turning his head to save others.
The water flows southward, "the terrain below is relatively low."
He swam near the south entrance of the Jingguang North Road tunnel, but he didn't know that it was a tunnel at the time because he couldn't touch the guardrail at the edge of the tunnel.
When he returned to the scene on the 21st, he recalled that the water was seven or eight centimeters higher than the guardrail the day before. “It's all submerged, it's all (like) a river, and nothing can be seen." Near the tunnel, the water flow was yellow. The waves rushed him down.
He fumbled for rescue skills, found a bus stop, clamped his legs on the guardrail, pulled water back with his hands, and slowly moved upstream, looking for people struggling in the water, and waiting for the right time to swim to them.
A car owner who was trapped in a tunnel recalled that when he abandoned the car, he saw someone turning back to save someone, and someone throwing a lifebuoy into the water.
Yuan Gebing is one of the rescuers.
At that time, no official rescue force arrived. When it was getting dark, Yuan Gebing saw the firefighter’s boat, "There are 4 people in the water, and there are two on board."
The firemen saw that he was well watered and gave him a lifebuoy.
He tied one end of the rope to his waist and the other to the lifebuoy to continue the search and rescue.
At one or two in the middle of the night, the forklift also came, but he could only help in shallow places. "The cab is a lot flooded in shallow places."
Most of the rescued were sent to the upstairs of the China Railway Zhengzhou Bureau Group Company, where food and hot water were provided for them.
When sending someone back to the company once, the person above saw that Yuan Gebing's expression changed a little, and he reached out and pulled him up, saying that he had stayed in the water for too long, and told him to rest and put him on a coat.
Yuan Gebing was indeed tired.
He was shivering from the cold, and the plate of potato shreds that he had eaten at noon in his stomach had been digested early.
At that time, there were more than 60 stranded people in the building. The food was finished and only one steamed bun was left.
He took a few bites and rested for 10 minutes, still not at ease, and looked out the window on the fifth floor.
It was dark, and the rain couldn't stop underground.
He stretched out his head and shouted, "Anyone else?" The only answer to him was the sound of rain, "It's too far, if there are people in the water, they won't hear it." He put down his clothes and went out again.
He couldn't remember how many more he saved, only remembering to ask "Are there anyone else" over and over again, and someone responded every time.
In the large, flowing black, Yuan Gebing can only rely on the direction of his voice and the weak sky to find the trapped.
The old lady, the little girl, the old man... When he dragged these strangers from the darkness to the light, his body was so cold that he didn't feel anything.
Finally, when three people were rescued from the green belt at the exit of the tunnel, he shouted again.
No one answered.
It was three or four o'clock in the morning when I returned to the shore.
He saw that many people who had just been rescued were too hungry. He remembered that when he was saving people near the green belt, he saw a white van full of instant noodles.
He jumped back into the water and found a foam box with 40 boxes of instant noodles.
"I couldn't help but eat a bag in the water. I really couldn't hold it." He said embarrassedly, "I came back and ate two more bags."
That night, he was lying on the ground wearing only his pants and barely slept for two hours.
He did not remember when he took off his clothes, nor did he remember that he still had a cell phone, ID card, or bank card in his pocket.
He only knew that the clothes were attached to his body, and when he was saving people, he fell down, "getting in the way".
Last year, I saved more than 2,000 yuan to buy a mobile phone.
He seldom loses things. When he came to Zhengzhou from Beijing, apart from clothes, he also brought a job that he had spent three or four years with. “It's not worth buying new ones.”
But he never thought about the lost things, "People are more valuable than things, so you can earn more money."
After waking up the next day, he returned to the rescue place, only to find that the words "Jingguang North Road Tunnel" were exposed.
Dozens of cars floated in the water, and the exposed part was covered with a layer of yellow mud.
He was worried that someone would be trapped in the car. "I have checked all the cars I saw three times, and as long as there is a bit of it, I will look at it." He slid to the roof and then tried to open the door.
If you can open it, leave your head outside and reach in with your feet to test.
Mr. Zhang, a citizen of Zhengzhou, used his mobile phone to record his vehicle inspection process, "I have been away for a long time and he is still there."
That morning, he found a victim.
Because there was no signal, the family members arrived at 4 or 5 o'clock in the afternoon, and the daughters of the victims rushed into the water when they arrived.
Yuan Gebing shouted at her, "Don't go down!"
"How do you save people!" The family members also yelled at Yuan Gebing.
Yuan Gebing was also uncomfortable, "I am not a rescuer, I am a civilian, and I will be rescued if I see it." But he didn't say anything.
The entrance of the tunnel was full of water, and a lot of silt was left in the shallowest place, and the ground was slippery.
He was worried that his family would be emotionally unstable and would slip into the water accidentally, and found more than 20 people in a circle to protect them.
After the family calmed down, they apologized to Yuan Gebing and wanted to give him some money to thank him.
Yuan Gebing refused to accept it, "If I ask for money, I will definitely not save it."
Yuan Gebing never collects money to save people at home, even though his family is the poorest in the village.
My father suffers from congenital muscle atrophy. One leg is not as thick as a normal arm, and he cannot do heavy work.
When my mother was herding sheep, she was caught and blinded in one eye and had poor eyesight in the other eye. She helped feed the chickens at home.
There have been people in the village who bullied Yuan Gebing's disabled parents, but they never returned, "Our family is kind-hearted." He doesn't shirk whoever asks him to save others. "It doesn't matter whether he recognizes it or not, it doesn't matter whether he has hatred or not."
On the 21st, in addition to investigating vehicles, he also took the initiative to maintain order at the scene and pulled up a cordon to prevent the crowds from falling into the water.
He didn't return to the dormitory until after 10 o'clock in the evening, when he was too sleepy to open his eyes.
"The road was washed up in a mess." The ground was full of silt and debris from all corners of the city.
He is not a local, and there is a power outage around him, "I don't even remember how to go back."
He could only ask as he walked, and made a lot of detours before he went home.
He walked for more than an hour in the usual few minutes.
Two cuts were made in his feet when he was saving people, and rheumatism was also committed, and his knees were so painful that he couldn't stand up, so he could only walk slowly.
Lying on the bed, Yuan Gebing felt pain like needles all over his body.
Early in the morning on the 22nd, he went to the scene to investigate vehicles.
The police cordoned off the scene, and he helped out on the periphery, running back and forth to carry food and drinking water.
At four or five in the morning, he saw a victim was found on the flyover, wearing blue pants and a shirt, as if he was about 20 years old.
He remembered that yesterday, a person told him that their family had just returned from Beijing and was washed away at the entrance of the tunnel.
There were 5 people in a car, only the children could not be reached, the hospital and the hotel were all searched.
"The shape of the head and face are more consistent." He felt like that man's son.
Yuan Gebing took down the license plate number of the ambulance, came out and told the father, and asked him to follow it.
The father didn't come back again, "it should have been found".
Yuan Gebing still remembers that string of numbers until now.
He did this without wanting to be known.
While maintaining order at the scene, someone wanted to cross the line. Yuan Gebing stepped forward to stop him. The person said, "What are you?"
He frowned and protested, "I'm not a gadget, I'm not a local, I saved more than 50 people over there yesterday!" This passage was photographed and posted on the Internet by passersby.
Someone deliberately made trouble in front of him, he became angry, "I haven't even eaten any food since noon yesterday, can you save me some energy!" After listening, a big brother bought him a pie, two Bottle of milk.
He believes that there are still many good people in the world.
When he was 14 years old, he had just arrived in Beijing to work, he was tricked into a black cotton factory, and only gave a steamed bun and a bowl of noodle soup a day.
He was always beaten with cotton-flicking bamboo sticks, with blood stains all over his neck and legs.
One night, he and another child climbed onto the cotton pile and escaped from the courtyard wall. They ran into a taxi driver and drove them to a restaurant door for free. The driver said, "Tomorrow you will tell the boss that you are hungry. You can work here first. ".
People's gratitude also made him indescribably happy.
He remembered saving a fat man weighing more than 200 kilograms. At that time, the man was in despair, worried that he would collapse the foam board and drag Yuan Gebing down.
Yuan Gebing has been around to encourage him.
When the man got to a safe place, his lips were already purple and black, and he shook his hand and said, "I would have died if it weren't for you."
He is no longer needed on the tunnel side. He went back to the overpass to help direct the traffic. His ID card and phone card were not in time. "Everyone is busy, I will wait and do it later. "The only inconvenience is eating. He has gone to the construction site for two days and has instant noodles distributed in the community.
He has almost no entertainment, and he doesn't usually look at his cell phone much. "I'm tired from watching too much, and I will delay working the next day."
Originally, painting was one of his entertainment projects. When he was young, he always carried a painting book with him.
But he hasn't started writing for five or six years. The last time he painted was in Baiyun Park in Guangzhou, he painted fish in the pond, "others say it's exactly the same."
He sometimes admires fish because he can't swim in the city anymore.
In the past 10 years in Beijing, the boss always defaulted on wages, he had no money to start a family, and the money he earned could barely support the family life.
Although he didn't feel sorry for what he had lost, he felt a little sorry for the lottery ticket in his pocket.
On the morning of the 20th, he read the news. There are five or six children in a family in Yunnan. They don’t have money to buy clothes and pants. He feels distressed, but he doesn’t have much money to donate, so he bought a lottery ticket. “I don’t know if I won the prize. Buy them something."
China Youth Daily·China Youth Daily reporter Jiao Jingxian Source: China Youth Daily