Red Cross Honors Four WWU Students
Myers and others recognized for saving lives
Lucas Myers recently received the Spirit of the Red Cross Hero Award for donating 10 gallons of blood. He is one of the youngest members of BloodSource's 10 Gallon Club.
Myers has a number of reasons why he gives, but one of the main reasons is a girl at his home church who has leukemia. “Without weekly blood transfusions, she wouldn’t be in remission today,” he says. Myers donates blood every week or even twice a week when possible. He mainly donates plasma, which has allowed him to donate more often. According to the American Red Cross, platelet/plasma donors only need to wait three days before they are eligible to donate again, versus 56 days for whole blood donors. To read more about Myers’ story, click on the links below.
Three other WWU students were also honored at the banquet. Austin Nystrom, Doug Stowers, and Kami Kostenko were presented with the Good Samaritan Youth Heroes award. This summer, while working at Leoni Meadows Camp in Northern California, Nystrom, junior theology, Stowers, junior theology, and Kostenko, sophomore undecided, were swimming with their friend Derek Hartley, freshmen physical education, when Hartley was pulled underwater by a whirlpool.
After pulling him out of the water, administering CPR and calling 911, and with the help of EMTs, Hartley was able to fully recover. The miracle was that they were able to call for outside help. Cell phone reception was poor. When Kostenko attempted to call, she had no bars. She offered a prayer and when she looked again, she had full bars. The EMTs said when they have had calls to this spot, it is a rescue, not a recovery, meaning that usually the person hasn’t made it.
These WWU students all hope that their actions will inspire and motivate others to do the same.
