A Newfoundland woman says a Halifax cab driver is her hero after he went out of his way to help her when she injured her arm.
“When arriving at St. John’s Airport, I slipped and fell. First I didn’t think anything was wrong,” says Nicole Slade, who flew from Newfoundland to Halifax on Nov. 16.
When she arrived in Halifax, she hailed a cab and headed to her hotel, but the pain in her arm continued to grow.
The cab driver could tell she was in pain and suggested she go to the hospital.
“I told her there’s no charge,” says Ed Benoit. “She won’t be left alone. I’ll look after her.”
Slade says Benoit took her to the hospital and stayed by her side the whole time.
“He carried my purse and my jacket the entire time. He knew everywhere to go, he advised me on the next steps,” she says.
Slade says Benoit helped her pass the time in the emergency room and kept her mind off her injury as she waited for X-ray results and to see a doctor.
“I told her about my wife and showed her pictures. Time went fast, and by the time I was done, I had a Newfie friend,” says Benoit.
After Slade was treated for a fractured elbow, Benoit drove her back to her hotel.
“He was wonderful. A perfect stranger,” says Slade. “He was there at the perfect time. I just kept thanking him over, all night.”
Slade says she will be forever grateful for Benoit’s kindness and has shared a photo of him on Facebook, along with her story. The post has been shared more than 7,000 times.
Benoit is surprised by the amount of attention he has received and says he just wanted to do the right thing.
“There’s time to be a taxi driver, but yet there’s time to be not a taxi driver, and that was the time not to be a taxi driver,” he says. “You had to be human being, and that’s what I did.”
With files from CTV Atlantic's Suzette Belliveau
