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Body armor saves paramedic and her baby in Dauphin County

HARRISBURG, Pa. — It was an everyday call for Dani Kamenar, a paramedic, when a patient attacked her. Kamenar said, “People are unpredictable. A pat...

HARRISBURG, Pa. -- It was an everyday call for Dani Kamenar, a paramedic, when a patient attacked her.

Kamenar said, "People are unpredictable. A patient could be cooperative one minute and then completely turn on you the next."

Kamenar is a paramedic for Community LifeTeam, the UPMC Pinnacle EMS service. She was 32 weeks pregnant at the time, but luckily for her and her daughter, Brooklyn, she was wearing body armor.

She suffered a partial placental abruption, but it could've been worse.

"The energy that could've been absorbed into my belly instead of the vest, it could have caused a full abruption which is lethal right then and there to infants the majority of the time," she said.

The Safariland Group body armor worn by Kamenar was issued to her last year, and the armor has been saving officers for 50 years.

Ed Hinchey, the senior armor technical specialist and director of the SAVES Club program, said, "This was the very first time that we got a call that an unborn child had been saved during an incident."

Kamenar and Brooklyn now join the SAVES Club.

"Where our gear played a part in saving their lives or reducing the amount of bodily injuries sustained," Hinchey said.

If not for the body armor, Kamenar said she and Brooklyn may not have been here today.

She said, "It saved her life. It saved mine because that abruption could easily have caused more harm to both of us."

Kamenar and her daughter are the 1988th and 1989th people saved by Safariland Group body armor across the country.

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