Homeless ‘angel’ saves newborn’s life at Oklahoma truck stop

A homeless man came to a newborn's rescue at a Oklahoma City truck stop on Thursday. His quick-thinking her life.

Keaton Mason and her fiancé were just minutes from home when Mason went into labour. With 911 operators on the phone to guide the delivery, Mason gave birth in the backseat of their Honda at a local truck stop.

The umbilical cord was wrapped around the 4-pound 11-0unce baby's neck. The child wasn't breathing.

"The lady was screaming, 'My baby, my baby's blue… she's not breathing," 911 caller Jennifer Morris told News 9.

Gary Wilson, a homeless man trying to hitch a ride east, was at the truck stop and quickly attended to the panicked mother and child.

Wilson calmly and carefully freed the infant's neck from her umbilical cord, tied it off and rubbed the newborn's back.

Mason told News 9 that Wilson's reassuring demeanour kept her calm throughout the ordeal.

"He did everything perfectly right," said paramedic Sandra Lesperance.

"I would describe him as kind of looking like Jesus," truck stop employee Waneva Morris said. "He had the long hair, the long beard. [He was] a very nice gentleman."

To thank the stranger, employees at the truck stop offered Wilson a hot meal and place to spend the night.

Despite being born four weeks early, the baby, named Tatum Brown, is doing well.

"He was our angel that night, that's for sure," Mason said of Wilson.