KAUFMAN COUNTY, Texas — A Dallas ISD high school English teacher isn't too proud of the adrenaline-fueled colorful language he used during a dramatic rescue Monday night. But he is glad that he was in the right place when two balloonists in the middle of a life-threatening accident desperately needed his help.
"I hope this dude's OK," Israel Alfaro said in the cellphone video he recorded as he approached the downed balloon.
The W.H. Adamson High School teacher said he was watching the balloon descend when he noticed it was coming down much too quickly.
"And I could see them ripping the sandbags, they were trying to lighten their load," he said. "They landed on top of the power lines. Everything automatically engulfed in flames. The basket, everything was just in flames."
As Alfaro approached, he could see the two men struggling to get out of the basket, with it and the grass around them ablaze. The first of the two pilots from Poland was able to crawl out, the second could not.
"And I looked inside the basket and you could barely see because of all the flames and the smoke, and that's why I realized there was a second person," he said of the second pilot who suffered extensive injuries, including broken bones in his legs.
After Alfaro helped pull the man from the balloon basket, the language barrier led to more anxiety and confusion.
"Honestly, it was terrifying when we were trying to find out if there was a third person with them in the hot air balloon, and we couldn't get a response because they didn't understand us and we didn't understand them," he said.
"And I would say like 50 seconds later that's when whatever tank they had in there exploded," Alfaro said of the loud explosion he captured on his cellphone video.
"And it could have been a completely different story," he said of the risk he faced if the tank ignited while he was pulling the pilot from the basket.
The two men from Poland, participants in the Gordon Bennett Gas Balloon Race, crashed 600 miles after their Saturday departure from Albuquerque, New Mexico. Wednesday, they were still in Parkland Hospital in Dallas recovering from serious burns and broken bones.
Alfaro said that just last week he was trying to teach his students to value every moment, that life is precious, and that you should always count your blessings.
He returned to school this week with living proof.
"For myself and the pilots, they are blessed to be alive," he said. "I just did what I think is right. I think I did what anybody else would do. You see somebody that needs your help and you go and help."