A man is recovering in hospital on Tuesday after he was pulled out of a burning building in southeast Calgary on Monday morning.
At 6:30 a.m. on Monday, fire crews were called to the housing complex in the 5400 block of 10 Avenue S.E.
All nine units in the building in Penbrooke Meadows needed to be evacuated.
Officials say they are crediting one bystander for alerting the residents about the fire before they arrived on scene.
Ali Jomaa saw the fire and began banging on the doors of the complex to wake the residents. He says that he heard a man calling for help from inside one of the units and leapt into action.
“I just broke the door. He was just coming down the steps there, so when I got him, I pulled him out with my hand,” Jomaa said. “I didn’t go inside the house because the flames were coming towards me.”
EMS took the man, who is in his 50s, to Foothills Hospital, saying he suffered serious burns to his upper body as well as smoke inhalation.
Police say he is in an induced coma.
There is no word on the cause of the fire, but authorities don’t believe it was suspicious.
