How 2 Ontario Purolator drivers helped rescue a man walking into oncoming highway traffic

Melinda Olah and Manohar Rehal received letters of appreciation from OPP after helping save a man's life in April. Their transport trucks blocked traffic before police arrived.

A pair of Purolator drivers in Guelph, Ont., are being labelled as heroes by provincial police after saving a man walking into oncoming traffic on a highway.

Line-haul driver Melinda Olah says she saw a pedestrian in distress as she was approaching Highway 410 on April 29.

“The visibility of him was so last minute, it was near hitting him,” Olah said. “And that was the same thing for any of the other vehicles that were travelling the same way.”

The man was walking into the oncoming traffic lanes and Olah said drivers would have had next to no time to react.

She contacted OPP and slowly travelled behind the man, going five kilometres an hour, for about 20 minutes until another one of her colleagues arrived to help.

Olah said she was nervous and “on the edge of her seat” before Manohar Rehal arrived.

“All of sudden the truck pulls over and I realize it’s another Purolator truck,” she said. “He rolls down the window and (was) like, ‘Hey, are you OK?’ I’m like, ‘Oh man, I can’t even tell you the sense of relief I had.'”

Rehal and Olah used their two transport trucks to block the lanes and follow the man to ensure he was safe before police arrived.