'I have a baby myself': Hero cop recalls dash with wounded Times Square girl
Officer Alyssa Vogel offered words of comfort Sunday to Skye Martinez’s mother
{{#rendered}} {{/rendered}}The hero NYPD cop caught on video clutching the 4-year-old girl wounded in the Times Square shooting shared a Mother’s Day message to the tot’s mom: "She’ll be OK."
Officer Alyssa Vogel offered words of comfort Sunday to Skye Martinez’s mother — a day after the woman watched her baby take a bullet to the leg during a visit to the tourist mecca.
"Keep your head up," Vogel told The Post when asked if she had a message for the injured tot’s mom. "The little girl’s going to be able to walk again. She’ll be OK."
{{#rendered}} {{/rendered}}NYC SAW SHOOTINGS SKYROCKET 182%
The fast-acting officer — a mom to a 6-month-old boy herself — recalled trying to reassure Skye’s mother in the moments after the shooting late Saturday afternoon.
"I kept telling her to breathe, that I know what she’s going through because I have a baby myself," said Vogel. "It was very difficult for her, very traumatic. She saw her daughter just get shot."
{{#rendered}} {{/rendered}}"I kept telling her to breathe and that her daughter was going to be OK," she added. "I kept trying to calm her down because she was obviously very scared."
Vogel, a former school teacher who joined the NYPD four-and-a-half years ago, also said the tiny shooting victim was "the strongest little girl I’ve ever seen."
"This little girl was so strong," she recalled. "She didn’t even cry once except when we were putting the tourniquet on. She screamed because it’s very painful."
{{#rendered}} {{/rendered}}Vogel was caught on dramatic surveillance footage bolting down Broadway with Skye in her arms after gunfire broke out at the Crossroads of the World shortly before 5 p.m. Saturday.
The girl, the youngest of three victims injured in the fracas, was struck in the leg.
"I just picked her up so I could run to the ambulance," she said.
{{#rendered}} {{/rendered}}"She was just saying she wanted her mom," she continued. "Her mom was running right behind me, but she was calling for her mother."
At Bellevue Hospital, Vogel’s maternal instinct kicked in.
"I actually got out of the ambulance with her and ran her to the pediatrics unit, where the doctors took over," she said.
{{#rendered}} {{/rendered}}Skye is expected to make a full recovery.
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Vogel comes from a family of New York City cops — inspiring her to join the force.
{{#rendered}} {{/rendered}}"My dad used to be a cop," she said. "My husband’s a cop. My brother is a cop. I just wanted to join the police department and help people."
To read more from the New York Post, click here.