‘He probably wouldn’t be here right now’: Portland bicyclist pulls man from house fire

PORTLAND, Ore. (KPTV) - A person was pulled to safety from a house fire by a good Samaritan on Friday night in east Portland, according to Portland Fire & Rescue.

PF&R said at about 10:20 p.m. Friday, firefighters responded to a fire coming from windows on both sides of a house in the 14100 block of East Burnside Street. There was also smoke coming out from the eaves of the one-story house. There was a report of someone trapped inside a bedroom, but firefighters could not find anyone.

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During fire suppression, firefighters learned the trapped person was pulled out of the bedroom window by a passerby. The good Samaritan left the scene shortly after and did not provide his name. One of the people who lives in the house, Randy Warner, said a person on a bicycle pulled out his roommate Gary. He was taken to a hospital for evaluation.

“Right through the window he came,” Warner said. “But if the guy on the bicycle wouldn’t have heard him hollering and brought everybody else’s attention, Gary would’ve been stuck in his room. He probably wouldn’t be here right now.”

Warner has called the house home for 10 years now. He and four of his roommates made it out without any assistance, but a cat and a dog did not survive the fire.

“Not too good,” he said. “But I’ll fall back and regroup.”

The fire left nothing but burned belongings behind inside and out.

“It was all upstairs and it just eradicated it all,” Warner said. “Three bedrooms upstairs, kitchen, living room.”

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Firefighters attacked the fire using multiple hose lines and vertical ventilation. Crews on scene got to work and were able to put most of the fire out after about 10 minutes.

“(PF&R) did good,” Warner said. “They knocked it down. (I) thought it was out, it started up again in the back and they were on it.”

A firefighter suffered mild to moderate burns to his head, knuckle and left shoulder from searching for the victim for several minutes under high-heat conditions. A battalion chief took the firefighter to a hospital for evaluation.

The cause of the fire is still under investigation.

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