Off-Duty Firefighter Springs Into Action Following East Village Explosion
NEW YORK (CBSNewYork) - An off-duty firefighter near the explosion in the East Village Thursday sprang into action, climbing into the smoking building as others were climbing out.
In cell phone video taken Thursday, you see a woman in the upper right of the screen climbing down a fire escape above the smoking store front that exploded. Then, you see a man with his hands in the air yelling up to the woman, telling her how to work the drop ladder to get down.
That man is off-duty firefighter Mike Shepherd, who spoke to the media Friday.
"A young woman came out on the third floor screaming and yelling and just hysterical," Shepherd said.
Shepherd was in the area after work running some errands when the explosion happened.
"I heard a loud explosion and I looked down the block and I just started running," he said.
Shepherd then ran toward the scene to help others.
Off-Duty Firefighter Springs Into Action Following East Village Explosion
"A lot of victims on the floor and I saw a lot of people rushing over to help so I ran over and I looked up and I said, 'I wonder if the people are inside,'" he said.
After the woman on the fire escape was down, Shepherd climbed up.
"Climbed it, started searching from my way up from the second floor, opened the window and looked in and the floor was collapsed," he recalled.
Shepherd made it all the way to the top but didn't notice anyone and then saw the building really starting to smoke.
"The people in the street were screaming to me, you know, 'You've got to get down, the fire's getting bigger.' I started working my way down," he said.
After hearing Friday that two people were still unaccounted for, he only regrets one thing about his climb without his fireman's gear.
"I wish we could've you know got in there and maybe located one of the victims," he said.
