Hero’s effort saves the day
Published: January 23, 2006
With flames and black smoke closing in on a man trapped on a third-floor deck yesterday, and firefighters still racing to the Beverly apartment blaze, civilian Brian King swung his work ladder up to the deck and shouted.
“Come down! If you don’t come down now, you’re going to die!” King called out as he and another man held the tall ladder in place.
Even with the heat of a four-alarm fire on his back, 62-year-old Richard Kress hesitated to step over the railing and lower himself down to a ladder that barely reached the bottom of the third floor balcony, King said.
Thanks to King’s and his fellow rescuer’s heroics, no one was hurt in the Folly Hills Apartments blaze, authorities said. The cause of the fire was still under investigation yesterday evening.
Six apartments suffered heavy fire damage, and residents of 12 additional apartments also were displaced because of smoke and water damage and a lack of power to the building.
King, an electrician, had been getting ready for work when the fire alarms sounded yesterday morning just before 11. When he saw a man leaning out over the railing of his balcony to breathe, King grabbed another man to help him fetch the adjustable ladder strapped to the top of his van.
“It barely reached,” King recalled. “At that point, the fire was way out of control.”
After some none-too-gentle coaxing, Kress shakily climbed down to safety, King said.
Kress looked dazed as Red Cross workers helped him make arrangements. He was too shaken to talk about his rescue.
The dramatic scene felt to King as if it took 15 or 20 minutes to unfold, leading him to question what took Beverly firefighters so long to respond. But Beverly Fire Capt. Peter O’Connor said a Danvers engine arrived six minutes after the call, followed immediately by one from Beverly. The complex is near the Danvers line.
The Red Cross placed about 10 people in area hotels, an official said.
“I don’t even know what I have left in there, if anything,” said Omar Canales, who came home yesterday morning to find fire trucks blocking his way.
Canales lived directly above the ground-floor apartment where the fire began. He stood behind the fire line fighting back tears waiting for word of Trouble, a 5-year-old pit bull-greyhound mix he was dogsitting for his sister.
When a firefighter told him the dog had died in the blaze, Canales couldn’t hold back his tears.
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