Neighbors rescue 9-year-old boy from well in Texas

MINERAL WELLS, Texas, March 24 (UPI) -- Relatives of a Texas 9-year-old who plunged into a well while playing in a vacant home's yard are praising their "hero" neighbors for executing a swift rescue.

Shawnee Coomer said her nephew, Jaxson Tune, 9, was playing with some other kids in the yard of a vacant home Saturday when he fell through the tin and old wooden boards covering an old well. Witnesses said the boy was doing pull-ups on the bar over the well before he fell through.

"All he remembers is picking flowers and then waking up in the hospital," Coomer told KXAS-TV. "He doesn't remember the accident, he doesn't remember falling through."

Neighbors Joshua Richard and Christopher Hicks cleared off the remaining tin and tile and found a strap long enough to lower Hicks down into the well.

"We needed to get into there quickly. He hit his head pretty good," Richard told WFAA-TV.

A Mineral Wells police officer arrived on the scene and also climbed into the well to help the men lift Jaxson to safety.

"I'm just glad I was able to be around and he was around when we did [act], because there's no telling what would have happened to that little boy," Richard said.

Jaxson suffered a fractured skull and needed more than 50 stitches and surgery to relieve pressure against his brain. He was sent home from the hospital Monday.

"All I remember is waking up with one light above me and I was very cold and I didn't know what was going on," the boy said.

The family praised Hicks and Richard as "hero" neighbors, but the men said they were just in the right place at the right time.

"I don't consider myself a hero," Hicks said. "I did what any good-natured human would do. They're calling me a hero, an angel; I'm not. I'm just a normal human being."