ALERT TRUCKER AVERTS FREEWAY DISASTER.

Byline: Dennis McCarthy

Odds and ends from around the Valley:

There's a big rig trucker out there who saved Rhonda Herman's life last Thursday night on the Hollywood Freeway, and her husband, Rod Hendricks, wants to publicly thank him.

The Burbank couple was living out one of this city's worst nightmares - a wife frantically calling her husband at home from her car phone, telling him she was sitting in her stranded car that had just died in the No. 3 lane of the freeway.

All power in the car was lost instantly, so she couldn't make it to the freeway shoulder or use her emergency lights to warn motorists coming up behind her.

It was 7 p.m., and dark outside. Cars were whizzing by her, brakes were screeching from the autos swerving to miss her. She was petrified.

Hendricks told his wife to tighten her seatbelt as much as she could, then he called 911. They had already received calls for help and were on their way, the police dispatcher said.

Hendricks got in his car and sped to the location, just north of the Tujunga Avenue offramp of the freeway. By the time he got there, CHP officers David Sanov and Chris Vanklaveren had already pushed Herman's car to the freeway shoulder.

``Rhonda was still shaking like a leaf, and the officers were trying to calm her,'' Hendricks said. ``I thanked them for staying with her until I got there, but they said it was the trucker who I should really thank. He saved her life.''

Hendricks looked around for the man, but he had already left.

As Rhonda Herman had sat petrified in that car, looking in her rearview mirrow at cars barreling toward her, she finally shut her eyes tight and prayed.

So, she never saw the trucker a few hundred yards back size the situation up, put on his emergency flashers, change lanes, and slowly come to a stop behind her car.

Protecting Herman and other motorists lives with his big rig.

``If he hadn't done that there could have been a massive pile up with my wife in the middle of it,'' Hendricks said. ``I owe that trucker a lot.''

If you're reading, he just wants to say thanks.

The guys over at Mint Canyon Moose Lodge 2173 in Canyon Country came through big time Saturday for 6-year-old Stephanie Lynott, who has finally come home from Childrens Hospital Los Angeles after three months.

More than $6,000 was raised from a benefit breakfast open to the community and hosted by the Moose Lodge, which is trying to help Stephanie's mom, Leslie, get through some tough emotional and financial times.

The little girl, who suffered some brain damage after lapsing into a coma for more than a week at the hospital, will continue her rehabilitation at Northridge Hospital Medical Center.

The $6,200 raised from throughout the community will be used for a reliable used car to get them back and forth to the hospital for those rehab sessions, Leslie said Monday.

``Here were all these people who really don't know us, opening their hearts to us like this last Saturday,'' she said. ``It's incredible and very emotional for us.''

Butch La Bash, a Moose lodge member who helped organize the breakfast, added the benefit couldn't have succeeded without the strong support of the customers at Club Ted, a local pub in Canyon Country, and local VFW members.

And finally, it's time to blow taps for one of the Valley's most patriotic veterans, Robert Coty, who died at 68 last Tuesday, Feb. 22.

If you've ever driven in the 5000 block of Laurel Canyon Boulevard in North Hollywood, you've seen Coty's flag. You couldn't miss it.

The Korea and Vietnam veteran flew the 5-1/2-foot-by-9-foot American flag from his apartment house balcony everyday, taking it down at sunset.

The first time I met Coty, in 1989, that flag was about to cost him his job managing his apartment building.

The new owners told Coty to take it down because it distracted motorists from looking at the building's rental banners.

Not only did Coty refuse to take his flag down, he threatened to put in some illuminating night lights so he could fly the flag longer everyday.

It wound up getting him fired for insubordination, but Coty didn't care. He knew too many men who had died for that flag, and he was damned if he was going to let some management firm tell him he couldn't fly it.

Coty wound up managing another apartment building near his old one, and his big American flag went back out on his balcony for the world driving by to see and enjoy.

The only thing that could make him take it down was death.

``Dad enjoyed standing out there at sunset and watching all the people coming home from work look up from their cars and see his big American flag flying from his balcony,'' said daughter Rene Coty.

``They'd blow their car horns and wave. He was so proud.''

R.I.P., Robert. You were a hell of a guy.

Memorial services for Coty will be held Saturday at 5 p.m., at Saint David's Episcopal Church, 11605 Magnolia Blvd., North Hollywood.