Heart-pounding bodycam video shows the frantic moments a Tennessee police officer leapt inside a home engulfed in flames to rescue a mother and her two children.
Officer Rogers with the Chattanooga Police Department charged toward the roaring inferno as it ravaged a two-story building in Hixson just before 10 p.m. on May 1, according to harrowing footage released by the department Monday.
After neighbors told Rogers that people were still inside the building, he “immediately jumped into action” and ushered two children and their mother to safety. He then pulled out a fire extinguisher to curb the rapidly spreading flames on the front porch, the clip showed.
Rogers carried Marlowe, 4, out of the fire to safety, while her mother, Rachel Blaylock, followed out with her son, 10-year-old Charles, Newschannel9 reported.
“I keep thinking back, how was I going to get two kids down the stairs?” Blaylock the outlet. “He just grabs her, and he was willing to go back in. And I was trying to tell him that no one else was there, but he was going back up.”
“I tried to thank him that night, and he’s just shrugging it off, like it’s just another day at work, but that’s my little daughter,” the mother recalled.
Nobody was injured during the fire, authorities said.
“Police are not trained in firefighting, but they do take an oath to serve and protect. And that is exactly what Ofc. Rogers did when he was first on the scene at a recent residential fire with flames visible by the front door,” the Chattanooga Police Department wrote in a statement.
“Thank you, Officer Rogers, for your bravery and dedication to serving our community. CPD is proud to have exemplary officers like you.”