Hero Boy Takes Wheel, Saves Kin

He won't be eligible for a driver's license until the year 2017, but Tustin Mains, a six-year-old from North Platte, Neb., got behind the wheel a little sooner -- and became a hero.

Mains grabbed the wheel of his family's pickup truck when his father passed out from low blood sugar, keeping the vehicle from crashing until an officer could bring it to a halt, police said.

"I hopped up there and drove it," Mains says. "I had my hands on the steering wheel."

Mains was in the back seat with his three-year-old brother Sunday when his father, Phillip Mains, slumped over at the wheel, the boy told police. The family had been driving home from a restaurant.

"I remember getting up to about the mall -- that was about 6:45," Phillip told The North Platte Telegraph. "The next thing I remember was waking up to the officer and paramedics, and it was 8:15."

Tustin leapt into his father's lap so he could steer and see out the windshield. Mains' foot had slipped off the accelerator, but even at idle, the Chevrolet Avalanche was going an estimated 10 to 15 mph, police said.

The kindergartner steered the truck about two miles, even turning around when he entered a neighborhood he didn't recognize, until he was spotted by police.

"The boy looked pretty much terrified," said North Platte officer Roger Freeze. "He looked right at me with that look of, 'Please help us." '

Freeze ran up to the moving pickup, reached through an open window and rammed the gearshift into park.

When he saw his dad "fall asleep," Tustin said, he got frightened, then got another scare when officer Freeze appeared at the truck's window. But when Freeze abruptly stopped the pickup?

"I was just happy," Tustin said.