Idaho postal hero loses job after crash

COEUR D'ALENE, Idaho — A Coeur d'Alene postal worker cheered last month as a hero for helping to rescue an elderly woman on his delivery route has been let go because the delivery truck he was driving crashed, according to his father.

Isaac Fish, 21, was credited with helping save Eugenie Simons, a senior who had fallen in her home, was immobilized and had gone without food or water for at least four days.

Fish, a temporary employee with the U.S. Postal Service for nearly three years, called authorities on Jan. 27 and requested a welfare check of Simons' home after noticing several days worth of mail piling up in her mailbox.

Last week, Fish was honored with the National Post Carrier Award for his action.

But his days with the service are numbered.

Fish told the Coeur d'Alene Press that his one-year contract would not be renewed and that his last day with the service is this Saturday. Fish declined to comment on the reasons his contract would not be extended another year.

But his father, David Fish, said his son was being let go because of a crash involving his postal delivery truck. David Fish told the newspaper that the accident occurred along an icy roadway shortly after his son called police to check on Simons. Nobody was hurt in the crash, but the impact of the truck sliding along an icy road into a private mailbox shattered the front windshield, he said.

"This involved no people, no other cars," David Fish said. "This is the craziest thing."

Coeur d'Alene Postmaster Dave Hoover declined to comment on the contract decision, citing Postal Service policy not to discuss personnel matters.

David Fish and other postal employees said the service has a policy that allows supervisors to let go of temporary employees involved in a vehicle crash.

"I'm very disappointed," said Hoover, who added that the decision was made by officials at the postal center in Spokane, Wash. "He was an awesome carrier, an awesome individual."

Isaac Fish said the news was devastating.

"It was my life," he said. "I've been working 10-hour days, six days a week for the last three years, and I've had zero spots on my record."