Grass Valley police rescue unconscious man from burning home, body camera video shows
First responders saved an unconscious man from a burning home in Grass Valley last week, with video showing police officers gaining entry to the home and dragging him to safety by his feet.
The Grass Valley Police Department posted video to Facebook this week of the Feb. 18 incident taken from one officer’s body camera during a house fire response on East Empire Street.
The officer and his partner first approach the residence, where smoke is seen billowing from a front entryway, the video shows. People outside the home tell police that a man named “Cory” is still inside the house.
An offscreen voice also tells the officers that the home is too hot to enter.
“Nothing could be seen inside, and there was no reply when Officers called the victim’s name,” a text transition in the Police Department video explains.
The officers then make their way to the side of the house, pushing past ladders and other objects to get to a side door. As they do so, flames are shooting out of a window near the rear of the home, video shows.
The officer wearing the body camera kicks down the side door and gains entry to what appears to be a laundry room. A man is on his back a few feet inside the doorway, barefoot and wearing jeans and a green T-shirt, unresponsive.
The camera-wearing officer drags the victim toward the doorway by one foot, then pulls him out of the building by both feet.
“I got him!” the officer yells to his partner. “Go get the medics.”
Medics arrive and provide treatment, later carrying the man to an ambulance on a stretcher while the officers return to the side of the house to check for additional victims, the video shows.
“Active fire had consumed the location where the victim had been located” by the time they returned, text included in the video says.
The Grass Valley Police Department says the victim was flown to a Sacramento hospital. The man suffered burns and smoke inhalation, but is expected to recover, according to the video.
