A suburban New York firefighter said that his instinct and training kicked in when he spotted a burning car on a Connecticut roadside this weekend and went on to rescue the injured driver.
Nicholas Perri Jr. was off-duty, driving home from work, and didn't have firefighting gear when he saw the blazing vehicle on the side of Route 7 near Brookfield early Saturday morning. But he pulled over, ran to the fire and "did the best I could do," he told NBC Connecticut.
"I used every ounce of muscle and adrenaline possible," Perri told the news station in a story published Sunday.
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He said he broke the front passenger-side window and was able to pull the driver through it after struggling a bit to free one of her legs, which was mangled.
An off-duty New York firefighter saved a woman from a burning car in Connecticut over the weekend.
"I said, ‘Listen, you have to work with me because we're running out of time here,’" he told the news station.
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Brookfield volunteer firefighters and EMS personnel arrived to find Perri guiding the driver to them. She was taken to a hospital.
Brookfield Fire Chief Andrew Ellis is convinced the woman would have died without Perri's help.
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"There is no doubt in my mind," Ellis told NBC Connecticut.