An elderly man is alive today thanks to quick thinking from an Auburn woman.

Auburn police say Earl Moorman, 75, was riding a motorized scooter on Washington Street and got stuck on the tracks. Ashley Aldridge, 19, who lives near the tracks, heard the man screaming for help and bolted out the door.

“I was making lunch for my kids and I just happened to have my window open this morning,” Aldridge told WTAX’s Ray Lytle Tuesday afternoon, noting she wasn’t planning on having the window open due to forecast temperatures in the mid 80s. “I went to ask my neighbor if he would watch my kids for me for a minute, and as I’m doing that I hear the horn from the train and the arms start coming down — I didn’t even think, I just ran over.”

Aldridge pulled Moorman out in the nick of time and carried him to safety. Aldridge, by the way, weighs about 130 pounds. Moorman? About 200.

“She’s my guardian angel,” Moorman said.

The wheelchair was destroyed.

“I tried to grab him from under his arms and I tried to lift him up, and at first I couldn’t,” Aldridge said. “Then I looked up, and I saw the train getting even closer and I just started freaking out. I tried to lift him again, and I don’t know how I did it, but I ended up lifting him up and I started pulling him back, and just about as soon as I pull him towards me, the train hit his wheelchair.”

Police told Aldridge it was an Amtrak train speeding through town at 81 mph.

Both Moorman and Aldridge were uninjured, though Aldridge says she’s shaken up by the ordeal.