Jean-Luc Wertenschlag, on the entrance line to assist victims | EUROtoday
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” Ln November 13, 2015, I came down from my house to help the victims on the terrace of La Belle Équipe. It was Friday the 13th, I was with my daughter, Opale, while my wife, a night nurse, was at work. At 9 p.m., like every Friday, we watched NCIS on TV. Around 9:30 p.m., a fire broke out. I did my military service, I fired automatic weapons: I recognized the noise. My daughter and I immediately went to take shelter at the other end of the apartment. I called the police, I got an answering machine, I had no idea that their line was already full. I needed to figure out what was going on, so I approached the bay window.
Below, going through the terrace, I see a automobile stopped. Three people shoot on the restaurant on the foot of the constructing. It’s not a settling of scores, I see a company. I flip off the flash on my cellphone and, from the second ground, I take pictures. I’ll have two usable ones. One fires in bursts, one other fires on the vehicles, the third advances in direction of the terrace, disappears from my visual field however I hear him firing one after the other. When they get again within the automobile, I say to my daughter: “There are injured people, I have to get out.” I’m a primary aider, I take my package from the medication cupboard. I ask Opale to remain hidden and name her mom.
Robot mode activated
I open the carriage door and there, the sound is deafening, like if you find yourself within the mountains, at altitude. Everything appears to be getting in gradual movement. I arrive on the left a part of the terrace. Traders are already serving to. Automatic mode is activated. I move a physique: I know that I can do nothing. Further on, I see a younger girl with a wound on her left thigh, blood is popping out in a stream. Automatic mode is engaged. I put my package on a chair, take out some compresses and press. I ask her to press, she tells me she will be able to’t as a result of she has a bullet in her arm. In actuality, she has 4 on her physique: within the thigh, within the arm, within the again, and a bullet which bounced off the enamel and caught within the cheek. I undo my belt, tighten it round my thigh till it is a notch. What surprises me is that she would not scream. I’d later be taught that gunshot wounds typically anesthetize. The blood stops. I did what I needed to do. I flip and see a wound on one other particular person. I rip off my t-shirt, stuff it into the wound and press. Then it is a black gap till assist arrives.
When the firefighters arrive, I’m going to the primary silver helmet I see. I arrive shirtless, my face fully ruined and I’m going to inform him that they fired a kalach. I do not even know if I keep in mind to say that I utilized a tourniquet anymore. Then I solely have one thought in thoughts: to return as much as see my daughter.
I had sheltered her from the bullets, not from the remaining. She heard the pictures, the screams, smelled the pungent scent of gunpowder. His concern was that I would not come again. Once I reassure her, one factor involves thoughts: I take into consideration what I walked into. There’s extra than simply blood beneath my sneakers. I take away them and rinse the soles till every part goes down the drain.
During the night time, I’m going to testify on the prefecture. I put the pictures again and round 5 within the morning I’m going house. From my window, I see a white tent open in direction of us: I see our bodies beneath bloody sheets. I shut the blinds so my spouse would not see this. And I fall asleep. I sleep very properly. For weeks, the adrenaline and endorphins carried me by way of, even my again now not damage.
One drop of blood and all of it comes again to me
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A yr later, whereas chopping a leg of lamb, a drop of blood seems after which it is over. I am unable to let go of the knife. My spouse takes it off, I collapse. The flashes, the smells, the pictures… Everything comes again. All my senses had been impacted that night. I noticed issues, however not solely that. I heard, I smelled and I touched. To get by way of it, I adopted EMDR classes, it’s a desensitization method utilizing eye actions. It helped me so much, however what labored probably the most for me was writing a guide. I used to be capable of engrave all my reminiscences someplace aside from in my head. Things I could not say, just like the story about my sneakers, got here out. It freed me.
Am I a sufferer? What I did that night time counts for little in our society. A phrase is lacking for the civilians who act earlier than the emergency companies. In English, we discuss “first liners”. I’ve typically been requested why I left my home that night. People who know me weren’t shocked. I’ve all the time executed first assist. When my father died, I used to be two and a half years outdated: I could not do something. Years later, that night, I used to be ready, for a second, to forestall loss of life from performing. Yes, I’d do it once more. »
https://www.lepoint.fr/societe/13-novembre-10-ans-apres-jean-luc-wertenschlag-en-premiere-ligne-pour-aider-les-victimes-09-11-2025-2602730_23.php