Teresa Gall had just finished babysitting her 17-month-old grandson, Liam. She was ready to go, she put him in his car seat and then threw the car keys in the front seat of the car, she then turned to hug her sister goodbye, and that’s when she realized what had just happened.
She lives in Missouri, and it can get very hot over there on those summer days. So, on that day, when she had closed the door and was about to say goodbye to her sister, she realized just how bad of a mistake she had made. The four car doors were locked and inside was her 17-month-old grandson, Liam.
She tries to open the car without much success, but then after only two minutes in the car with no air conditioning turned on, she starts to see the effects of the weather on her grandson. He starts to vomit profusely as well as cry, for a moment it also looks as if he is going to pass out. She then asked her sister to get a hammer from her house because she could not wait for someone to arrive and help them.
She starts hitting the car with all she’s got, at some point, Teresa and her sister had to take turns with the hammer because their arms had started to hurt. She then started to get desperate and that’s when she said a quick prayer, she asked God to send someone to help her.
At that very time, two football players from Missouri Western, Jack Long and Shane Simpson, were going back home from their afternoon practice. That day, they decided to take a different route home and ended up driving by where Teresa and her sister were struggling to break the car window with the hammer. Initially the boys thought it was weird to see a woman trying to break the car window with a hammer, there was something about that which did not make sense. After passing by, they came back because they figured she must be very desperate to try to get it open in that way, so they stopped to check if everything was okay.
They stopped and before they could even ask, Teresa ran to them and told them that they had to help her. She told them what was going on, that her 17-month-old grandson was trapped inside and that he was running out of time, she only hoped that it wasn’t too late.
