Amid the chaos that engulfed the Route 91 Harvest Festival in Las Vegas last fall, Gilbert Segovia became one of the many victims wounded when a gunman opened fire on the crowd.
Yet the Los Angeles letter carrier and former Marine also became one of the many heroes who put others first on that devastating day.
Segovia, who was attending the outdoor country music festival with family members, rushed his wife, Alicia, to a hiding place. Then he spotted an older woman alone on the ground in the open, bleeding profusely from a leg wound.
Segovia ran to the stranger’s side and applied pressure to her wound, but as he searched in vain for a pulse, he soon realized “her life was fading,” he later told the New York Daily News.
“It was nothing about being a hero, it was more about being human,” Segovia said.
He also realized his life was in jeopardy as he felt a bullet pierce his own leg.
Despite his pain, Segovia retrieved his wife, then led her and other relatives through a parking lot to a paint store, where he used his belt buckle to break a window so he could crawl inside.
Segovia opened the door and ushered about a dozen people to safety, including an anonymous health care worker who rendered first aid that helped save his life.
The death toll from the massacre reached nearly 60, with more than 500 wounded.
Segovia is recovering.