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‘Modern Family’ star, sister help injured woman in Utah’s Arches National Park

In this Tuesday, Aug. 3, 2021, photo provided by Shaji John, John's wife, Minnie John, center, poses with actress Julie Bowen, right, and Bowen's sister, Dr. Annie Luetkemeyer, left, after the pair cared for her after she fainted and hit her head on a rock while stopping to rest in Arches National Park, Utah. (Shaji John via AP)

MOAB, Utah (NEXSTAR) — A woman who fainted and hit her head on a rock after stopping to rest in Utah’s Arches National Park woke up to hear a familiar voice and wondered if she might be watching television.

In this Tuesday, Aug. 3, 2021, photo provided by Shaji John, John’s wife, Minnie John, left, poses with actress Julie Bowen, after Bowen and her sister, Dr. Annie Luetkemeyer, cared for her after she fainted and hit her head on a rock while stopping to rest in Arches National Park, Utah. (Shaji John via AP)

Minnie John of Oradell, N.J., said the last thing she remembered was putting her head in her hands.


“Next thing I hear someone with a familiar voice kept asking me questions,” she wrote in a Facebook post. “I wondered if i might be watching tv.”

The woman with the familiar voice kept reassuring her, John said, but she couldn’t place the voice.

“Her sister the doctor asked me to guess and I told her I just hit my head, I can’t remember. She said smiling ‘Modern Family’ and I said of course!,” John recounted about how she finally recognized Julie Bowen from her role on the long-running comedy series.

In her Aug. 3 post, John said she had been on a “bucket list” trip to Arches and hiking to see Delicate Arch, a four-story sandstone arch perched on the rim of a deep red rock canyon, for an hour and a half when she could not go any farther. She told her husband and son to go ahead as she rested along the trail, her head in her hands.

Julie Bowen and her sister Annie told her that their guide had seen her fall face forward on a rock, with her glasses breaking her fall, she said.

“Had I fallen sideways or backwards, I would have split my head,” John wrote.

They cleaned her up and gave her electrolytes as Julie Bowen assured her she was going to be OK, John said. They used her phone to call her son and some people selflessly ran ahead to find him, about 20 minutes ahead, to let them know what had happened, John said.

John said she fractured her nose and received five stitches later at the hospital. She expressed gratitude to God for sending people to help her.

“They were so caring and loving to stop like the Good Samaritan does in the Bible! They were God sent!” she wrote.

FILE – This June 1, 2018 file photo shows actress Julie Bowen at the Inspiration Awards benefiting Step Up in Beverly Hills, Calif. A woman who fainted and hit her head on a rock after stopping to rest in Utah’s Arches National Park woke up to hear a familiar voice and wondered if she might be watching television. Minnie John of Oradell, New Jersey then questioned whether she might know the woman who was with the doctor helping her, or if she was famous, according to a post on Facebook. After the doctor gave her the hint “Modern Family”, John says she finally recognized one of her helpers as Julie Bowen from the comedy series. The doctor was Bowen’s sister, Annie. (Photo by Richard Shotwell/Invision/AP, File)

John added that she was thankful for making the trek and getting to meet her two “Samaritans,” something that might never have happened had she known how difficult it was.

“Daredevil or dumb as can be, I still consider this trek up the mountain as one of my proudest achievements in my life. Sometimes you need to take those chances in life to live to experience heights and depths,” she wrote.

The Associated Press contributed to this report.