Hats off to DaVante Williams, the kind Uber driver who went above and beyond his call of duty to help his young passenger after a freak winter storm snarled traffic for hours.
DaVante Williams, The Kind Uber Driver
By no we’ve all heard about the winter storm that dropped several feet of snow and snarled traffic on I-95, particularly in Virginia. Some travelers caught in the 50-mile-long backup were trapped in their cars for over 24 hours!
DaVante Williams picked up a young female passenger at 2:00am at Washington’s Union Station and began traveling south toward Williamsburg, Virginia. Her train had been cancelled due to the poor weather.
About 20 miles into the journey of 2.5 hours, Williams noticed that cars and trucks had stopped moving. Checking traffic info, he found that roads ahead were closed due to downed power lines and trees.
With gas getting low and traffic not moving, Williams turned the car around and began the journey back north. Not wanting to leave the passenger alone at Union Station, he received permission form her parents to purchase her a hotel room…and used his own money to do so.
The following morning, he checked on her (via text) to make sure she was all right and offered to drive her down to Williamsburg for free. By this time, the girl’s family had driven up to pick her up, but showered him with thanks.
Uber has compensated him for the hotel room and the upscale ride share company Alto has offered him a job as a lead driver.
Uber said “Mr. Williams went above and beyond during this very stressful situation, and we thank him for his thoughtful actions,” and noted on Twitter that not all heroes wear capes:
Not all heroes wear capes ❤️ thank you, Davante! https://t.co/MlvQj3BBWe
— Uber (@Uber) January 5, 2022
CONCLUSION
Hats off to Williams for this kind gesture. What a nice move. It is often those unfortunate events like road closures and heavy winter storms that bring out the best in us. Now let’s pass it on.
image: DaVante Williams / Facebook
God bless this guy. Hopefully he took that other company up on their offer to leave Uber. Uber sucks!
Great story showing there are decent people still out there. That said, adding the free ad for Alto only gave them more of the exposure they were looking for. Calling them “upscale” again sounds like a paid ad for them. We can assume the kind driver isn’t planning on moving anytime soon so the job offer is again more free hype for them. Disappointed you put them in what was an incredible story without advertising them.
A reminder that amidst everything the majority of people are kind and caring.
I like this guy but I can just imagine if this was me as a driver. The headline would read 53 year old male Uber driver transports teen passenger to hotel overnight.
This guy’s lucky he’s young and hip looking. I would have been splayed over a patrol car with lots of splainin to do to the missus and probably a judge or three.
PS – The elephant in the room is that this was likely an unaccompanied minor which is strictly against policy.
Leave it to someone to be a downer on an otherwise uplifting story. You must be fun at parties.
Agree that he was taking a huge risk that other people would misinterpret his actions. That he still went ahead with what he did speaks volumes (in a positive way) about his character.
Hats off to Mr. Williams
Very well done, Mr Williams!