The Atlanta Police Department has released a video of two officers pulling a stunned man from a burning car after he suffered a violent crash, hitting two houses and a tree.
The video features more than 2 ½ uninterrupted minutes of the officers’ tense struggle to pull the man through the driver’s side window of his badly damaged car, which caught fire after a crash near the intersection of Oliver Street NW and North Avenue NW early Sunday morning.
As the video begins, two APD officers identified as W. Adams and M. Todd arrive at the scene of the fire and hop out of their patrol car. As the officers rush to the car, a witness calls out, “he’s still in there!” A man can be seen slumped with his forehead on the steering wheel. The crumpled door to the red hatchback is missing its handle.
The first officer says, “Hey, open up,” but the man in the driver’s seat does not react.
“OK, do it,” he says to the second officer, who shatters the window. The two officers then spend nearly two full minutes wrestling the driver from the car.
“The officers had no idea if that fire would result in an explosion which would put their lives in danger, instead they were focused on saving the driver,” the APD wrote in a Facebook post. Atlanta Fire and Rescue showed up as the man was pulled a safe distance from the fire.
Based on evidence from the scene, police believe the car “had gone airborne and traveled completely through two houses (one abandoned and another occupied) before striking a tree and bursting into flames.”
Police did not release the name of the driver or say if any charges would be filed in the incident.
“We could not be prouder of these two officers. Their response to this incident exemplifies our highest ideals and training,” the APD posted on Facebook. “This city is safer with these two heroes on patrol. Job well done!”
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