By Jeff Lipton
The carrier, George Valukis, was delivering mail to the home of a Berwick Road resident on Wednesday, Oct. 23, when he noticed the mail had been piling up in the home's mail box for about three days.
Valukis said the car was in the driveway and the garage door was half-way up.
Valukis, a mail carrier for close to eight years, inquired from neighbors about the resident's whereabouts, but they had not heard from her either.
The neighbors called police who entered the home and saw the woman, whose name has been withheld, inside the home suffering from a possible stroke, officials said. The woman was taken to South Nassau Communities Hospital in Oceanside, where she was recovering from her attack. Doctors said if she hadn't received treatment, she may not have survived. The victim's condition was not immediately known.
Yeah, that was a good heads-up by George Valukis, said a fellow postal worker at the Hewlett Post Office. He noticed that the mail had been piling up over the previous few days and figured that something may have been wrong. He immediately went and told the next-door neighbor who called police.
One postal official said the woman was on the floor with a stroke when police found her in her home. Doctors said if he [Valukis] didn't do what he did, she would have died in the house, the postal official said.
Valukis said he has gotten to know many residents on his mail route, which benefited him in this case. When you do what I've done this long, you get to know people. We all try to look out for one another, he said.
It does feel nice to be able to do something good, said Valukis, who lives in Oceanside.
Mike Pagano, supervisor for the Hewlett Post Office, said he's not surprised how alert Valukis has been on the job. He said about six months ago he saved a boy who was inside a car rolling backwards in near the post office. Valukis managed to stop the car and rescue the boy, he said.
I couldn't believe it, Pagano said upon hearing about Valukis' alert moves last week. I said, 'Wow, he did it again.'
