Marching onward: Injured Marine finishes Memorial Day Parade
Marine Corps veteran Bob Losser wasn't about to let a fall on Main Street keep him from finishing Butler's Memorial Day parade.
While walking for the first time in a Memorial Day parade, the 64-year-old veteran took a tumble Monday and fell face-first to the pavement.
“I lost my balance,” said Losser, who stated that he is diabetic and has Parkinson's disease. “I was surprised I got as far as I did.”
Losser, who said he served from 1975 to 1979, was walking with the Bantam Marine Corps League Detachment 743, which he recently had joined, when he collapsed just before the intersection of West Birch Street near the Alliance for Nonprofit Resources. Losser quickly was surrounded by community members, who provided some shade from the sun while emergency personnel checked his well-being.
Despite his predicament, he was determined to continue.The parade was paused while he was being assessed.Nearby paradegoers spoke to each other, hoping the veteran was OK. Seven minutes after the fall, an ambulance emerged from an alley.Losser was lifted onto a gurney, upright and conscious, and moved into the ambulance by EMTs as the crowd burst into applause.“I'd like to give the crowd a lot of credit,” said Losser, with a new portable glucose level monitor in hand. Maryann, Losser's wife, said a bystander ran to a nearby pharmacy to purchase the item.If Losser was going to fall, it couldn't have been in a better spot. Just across the street, enjoying the parade with his family was Butler Health System physician Dr. Michael Fiorina.Fiorina, along with his sister, Dianna Edwards, a physician's assistant according to their mother Jean Ward, rushed over to help.Twenty minutes later, after being medically evaluated and cleared to go, Losser emerged from the ambulance that pulled off Main Street into an alley. He had some damage to the left side of his face.
According to Ward, of Upper Burrell, all Losser wanted to do was finish the parade.Ward said her daughter, who lives in Renfrew, was determined to make that happen.“(Dianna) stopped one of the sports cars to drive the veteran,” Ward said. “It was extremely touching. The entire block was in applause.”As Losser left the Memorial Day presentation at Diamond Park that followed the parade, he wished all veterans well on Memorial Day.
