A Close Call For Mom, Son In Bathroom

After spending 14 hours trapped inside her bathroom, Gina Thompson knows guardian angels come in such forms as telephone technicians.

US West employee Jeff Irwin made the 911 call that freed Thompson and her 6-year-old son from the windowless bathroom. The pair had just finished brushing their teeth when they found the door would not open; that was 10:30 p.m., Monday.

Irwin knocked on Thompson’s front door around 12:30 p.m. Tuesday to tell her new telephone line was working. No one answered, but he heard a faint noise that piqued his interest.

Irwin peered in the windows but didn’t see anyone inside. He put his ear up to the door.

“I’d knock, and I’d hear a knock back, but it was really faint,” he said.

Using a key provided by Thompson’s sister, police entered the home and dismantled the bathroom door lock. Her infant daughter was alone in the adjacent room.

“The first thing she said to me was, ‘I’ve been sitting there praying for 14 hours,”’ said Irwin, who has worked as a phone technician for 24 years.

“I said, ‘I think your prayers were answered, because I don’t know what intrigued me about that noise.”’

Thompson and her two children were unharmed. She said she plans to write a letter to Irwin’s boss to let the company know of his heroics, but Irwin said it is all in a day’s work.