Mary Poppins might bill herself as practically perfect in every way, but we think Alyson Myatt just might have her beat in the nannying department.
Why? Early Tuesday morning, the 22-year-old live-in Kentucky nanny literally walked barefoot through flames to save her 5-year-old charge — a move that rightly earned her supernanny status, as well as serious burns on her feet.
“To physically run through flames is heroics to the nth degree,” Shelbyville Fire Chief Willard Tucker told The Courier-Journal newspaper. “To make a choice to charge right through flames is kind of above what are normal heroics.”
Yet in true hero fashion Myatt is modest about her deed.
“I didn’t even think about me getting hurt or getting burned,” Myatt told the Today show. “I really didn’t even think that I was barefoot. I was just yelling for Aden and I ran and got him. All of it happened really quick.”
The drama began around 3 a.m. Tuesday when a broken ventilation fan in an upstairs bathroom overheated and caught fire. Myatt put out the fire and called Aden’s father, a single parent who was away on business, and both agreed everything seemed fine. But three hours later the fan caught fire again and crashed to the floor, starting a much bigger blaze near Adan’s bedroom.
When she yelled to Aden, she realized he was cowering under the sheets in his bed and needed rescue. She did so without hesitation — a move fire officials say saved his life in the nick of time.
“It was like I was walking on goo ’cause all the skin. My feet were just burned off,” she told NBC affiliate WAVE 3 in Louisville.
Yet Myatt still managed to get herself and Aden out of the house and into their minivan. She then drove to a neighbor’s house using just her toes, which were less severely burned. From there they called the authorities and Myatt was taken to the hospital for treatment as Aden’s father, J.B. Hawes, rushed home.
“I came straight to the hospital and saw her on the bed,” Hawes told Today. “To realize what she did, saved my son’s life, you can’t thank someone for that. There’s nothing you can do to repay them for taking that kind of a risk.”
Myatt clearly has Aden’s eternal gratitude as well, telling Today, “I love her so much. I miss her when she’s gone.”
But thanks to Myatt’s amazingly heroic deed, it looks like she and Aden have many more fun adventures ahead.