By Nathan Hardin
nhardin@salisburypost.com
The driver of a tractor-trailer that overturned on Enon Church Road today has been released from Rowan Regional Medical Center.
According to N.C. Highway Patrol Trooper David Deal, driver Randy Jackson was cited for “exceeding a safe speed”?around the curve just after noon.
Rick Joplin and his wife were following the 18-wheeler when it flipped and dumped gravel along the ditch. They said Jackson, 60, went off the street, which has a steep drop on the shoulder, and tried to accelerate to get back on the two-lane road.
Joplin said he and his wife, Kimberly Joplin, stopped and immediately called 911 when they saw the truck overturn.
Joplin said he ran to the truck and couldn’t get the door open, so he pulled Jackson through one of the truck’s windows.
“My biggest fear was that he was going to be dead,” Joplin said. “I got in there and got him out.”
Joplin said the man was coherent and told him he worked for Trexler Trucking.
“I felt good,” Joplin said, “the man called me a hero for saving him.”
Joplin said the man was unable to walk and said he believed his left hip was injured.
Joplin pulled the man to his nearby Ford Explorer and kept him there until emergency personnel arrived.
Joplin said he wasn’t worried about the truck — which was leaking hydraulic fluid — catching on fire, but said he first asked the man if he was hauling anything that could explode before carrying him to safety.