This man runs away from the fire razing this house in Kencot, St Andrew on Monday afternoon. (Photos: Joseph Wellington)
Brave young men rescue elderly man from house fire
Two men are being hailed as heroes after rescuing an elderly man who was trapped inside a burning house in the St Andrew community of Kencot on Monday.
Stanley Tyson, one of the good Samaritans, said he was at a garage in the community when he was alerted to the mid-afternoon house fire at 29 South Road and, even worse, that an elderly man was trapped by the blaze.
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“Is up here so me deh, a vehicle over here so a fix, and me hear somebody a say ‘Fire down the road!’,” Tyson told the Jamaica Observer. “When I go down the road now I hear a man say ‘A old man in the house’ and I say ‘Weh you say?’”
Alarmed upon learning that the elderly man was trapped inside the house, Tyson said he did not hesitate to embark on the life-saving mission along with another man, Damion Brown.
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“Me say ‘you can’t take it from the front, we have to take it from the back,’” Tyson related his conversation with Brown.
“Me jump over the yard and over the fence, me and the other youth, and we go in and we see the old man just a get up out of the bed and we hold him and draw him out,” Tyson shared.
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The elderly man, 70-year-old Antonio Edwards, who is physically disabled, then had to be lifted over a fence by the two men to escape the fire.
“A lot of fire come behind we and we hold him and lift him over the fence,” Tyson said. “The next youth stay over the fence and me come over and we get him over the fence because him can’t walk.”
The rescued man told the Observer that despite being left homeless by the fire, he is grateful that his life has been spared and expressed gratitude to the two men for their heroic actions.
“Me grateful to them fi carry me over that fence. Them find it possible to help me and carry me over the fence,” Edwards said.
Recounting the incident, Edwards, a former tailor in the community, said that he was awakened from his sleep by residents alerting him to the fire, after which he noticed smoke.
“Me not even pick up the voice, but me hear somebody say ‘Fire!’, and me say, ‘Wait, fire?’ and then me see smoke a come through. Me say, ‘Hold on, fire’, and me start bawl fi fire to,” Edwards said.
Reflecting on his act of bravery, Tyson said he felt compelled to help Edwards because he has elderly grandparents, himself.
“I have grandfather and grandmother, so when them tell me the old man over there and the old man can’t walk, I had to go because him a go dead,” Tyson told the Observer.
Brown, the second good Samaritan, added: “A old man was in the house, we had to help him out… House, cylinder burn up, car burn up, a we save the man from burn up.”
Thick clouds of smoke could be seen rising from the dwelling, which sparked fire on the electrical wires, resulting in a power outage in the area.
While the cause of the fire is still under investigation, Edwards believes it may have been caused by someone tampering with the electricity.
The house was occupied by four people; however, only Edwards and a teenager were at home at the time of the fire.
No one was hurt.
Up to late Monday evening, firefighters were still battling the blaze.
A resident raised concerns about improper waste disposal, saying that that may have contributed to the fire’s rapid spread.
“What we are asking for is that the residents need to clean up the place, even the old junk they have in the yard. There is a place on Grove Road, the yard is very terrible with a lot of things, and the people have been making complaints about the same thing. We just thank God them save a life and no life has been lost,” she said.
