ATLANTA — Atlanta firefighters rescued a man from his burning apartment building on Monday. Neighbors told Channel 2’s Steve Gehlbach they saw him trapped on his balcony.
The fire happened Monday morning at an apartment complex on Troy Street in northwest Atlanta. A neighbor recorded the flames shooting from the second-floor apartment.
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“He was actually trapped on the balcony where the fire was. His body was actually on fire,” Shaquella Irby told Gehlbach.
Around 7:45 a.m. Monday, a security guard across the street saw the apartment building on fire and started knocking on doors and windows.
“I’d want someone to do the same for me,” Albert Foster said.
“I just went down there, started knocking on everybody’s doors. We kicked those two doors in and saw the fire was coming out of there, but it was so hot,” Irby said.
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They couldn’t get to the man who lives in the apartment where the fire started.
“But he went back in the apartment and stayed like 5 minutes, then he came back out and his whole back was on fire. He was in flames and screaming…we was telling him to jump. He was saying he couldn’t,“ Foster said.
Atlanta Fire Rescue arrived within a couple of minutes, got a hose, run to knock down the flames and a ladder up to the balcony to rescue the victim.
“Then they both went up there and got the man, picked him up and started to bring him down on a separate ladder,” Irby said.
The man was rushed to Grady Memorial Hospital’s burn unit. Three other adults from the upstairs apartments have been displaced.
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