For a year after the June 5, 2013 building collapse at 22nd and Market streets, Philadelphia Fire Chief John O'Neill agonized over whether he'd done the right thing for a woman he found alive who'd been buried under the rubble for 13 hours.
The woman, Mariya Plekan, lost the entire lower half of her body and suffered devastating health setbacks as a result of the injuries she suffered that day, she and her attorney, Andy Stern, said.
O'Neill, a 26-year veteran, wondered if by finding Plekan and saving her, firefighters left her with the kind of life she no longer wanted. Six people died in the collapse and were pulled from the rubble by firefighters. Plekan was the last victim to be removed from the pile.
That doubt melted away after he saw news reports last year in which Plekan thanked the men who saved her for giving her more time with her son, daughter and grandchild, and again on Friday, when O'Neill and Plekan met face-to-face for first time since her rescue two years ago.
"In the first year, I found from my faith, morally, what did I put her through," O'Neill said Friday at St. Ignatius Nursing & Rehab Center in West Philadelphia, where Plekan has been staying for more than a year. "I just struggled with would the other side of the coin have been better."
Plekan, now 54, thanked O'Neill profusely at their meeting on Friday.
"Sometimes it's difficult," Plekan, a native of Ukraine, said through a translator, her close friend Dariya Tareb. "But I am very grateful for what this person did. I am able to see my children."
Behind Plekan's gold-rimmed glasses, tears flowed down her cheeks as she thanked an emotional O'Neill for saving her and buying her more time with her son, Andreii, 27, and daughter, Natalie, 26.
She turned to him and, in English, told him, "I want to thank you very much, and God bless you and your family."
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Plekan's attorney, Stern, said he arranged the meeting as part of a day of remembrance on the collapse's second anniversary. She had been shopping at the Salvation Army thrift store at the corner that June 2013 morning when a four-story wall from a building being demolished next-door tumbled onto the shop. She said Friday that she never lost hope during the excruciating 13 hours she waited to be found and rescued.
O'Neill said when night fell at the scene and the intersection was finally silent, about 11 p.m., he first heard Plekan yell for help.
"I was in shock," the veteran firefighter said.
Stern in 2013 filed a lawsuit on behalf of Plekan, but declined on Friday to discuss any legal issues. Two men charged in the collapse, contractor Griffin Campbell and crane operator Sean Benschop, are scheduled to face trial for third-degree murder and related offenses in September.
Contact Morgan Zalot at 610.668.5574, morgan.zalot@nbcuni.com or follow @MorganZalot on Twitter.
