U.S. Senator Susan Collins was pleased to recently join in honoring a Maine letter carrier who was named the National Association of Letter Carriers’ ‘Hero of the Year’. Wayne Viger of Turner is credited with saving an elderly woman’s life while walking his mail route last year.
Viger, smelled smoke at an apartment building while he was on his route on April 3, 2006. Checking more closely, the 30-year veteran letter carrier heard a smoke alarm sounding inside, and then noticed smoke pouring through cracks in the windows and door of a ground floor apartment. Viger pushed open the door to find an elderly woman with her clothes aflame and her hair singed by the fire. He pulled the woman outside and extinguished her burning clothing. Then he reentered the building to check on other residents as he climbed to the second and third floors, knocking loudly on apartment doors and shouting to alert residents to the danger.