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As police officers raced up to a wooden house in the town of Culpeper, Virginia on the evening of Oct. 3, heavy smoke billowed out of the windows.
Residents who lived in separate apartments in the house stood outside, according to the Culpeper Police Department.
But one man hadn’t come out, they told police. They worried that he might be inside.
Culpeper Police Department officers enter a burning home to save a man from the fire. (Culpeper Police Department)
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Officer Ashley Sain didn’t wait. She rushed toward the house and went in without protective gear and began checking doors, searching for anyone who might still be inside.
Moments later, Officer Neal Coffey joined her.
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Body-worn camera footage shows one officer running up stairs, past “No Smoking” signs with red lettering posted on the walls.
On the second floor, the duo found a door that was locked from the inside. Smoke slipped through through cracks above and below.
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“Police department, if you’re in here!” Sain shouted over shrieking smoke alarms.
Police officers and firefighters responded to a house fire in Culpeper, Virginia, on Oct. 3, 2026. (Culpeper Police Department)
Meanwhile, Coffey quickly opened the lock with a pocket-size tool and cautiously swung open the door, calling out, “Police department!”
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But there was no answer.
Heavy black smoke poured from the bedroom. The officers could see flames.
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“Police department!” Sain shouted again. “Anybody inside?”
By that time, Sgt. David Cole and Officer Michael Beel had made it to the second floor, as well.
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Body-worn camera footage shows Coffey crawling on his hands and knees, then flat on the wooden plank floor, searching the room with a flashlight.
“I can’t see!” he shouted with a tone of increasing desperation, as he pushed through thicker smoke.
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He inched forward on his chest, feeling around through the smoke. Suddenly, he found a man lying unresponsive on a bed.
“Hey brother, come on!” he urges frantically, tugging the man’s arm.
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“Come on! Come with me!”
He shouted again through the smoke to fellow officers.
“We’ve got to get him out! I have him! He’s breathing!”
Video shows him struggling to move the man.
“Hey! We need help!” an officer shouted.
Coffey pulled the limp man onto the floor. Beel crawled in to help.
Together, the four officers dragged the unconscious man into the hallway.
Then a firefighter in protective gear emerged through the smoke.
A team of firefighters carried the man out of the burning building, and extinguished the fire.
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The rescued resident was transported to a hospital, then transferred to a regional burn center. His name and the cause of the fire have not been released because those details are part of an active investigation.
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Three of the police officers also were treated at a hospital for smoke inhalation and other injuries. They were released that evening.
Officers who helped save a man from a burning house fire received valor awards from the Culpeper Police Department. (Culpeper Police Department)
All four who braved the smoke and flames were honored with valor awards on Oct. 14, Capt. Kevin Tooley of the Culpeper Police Department told Fox News Digital. He was a supervisor on the scene.
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“They went above and beyond the normal call for a police department,” Tooley said of his team.
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“We normally don’t go into burning buildings. I mean, that’s not our job. That’s typically the fire department’s job. But we don’t know how to say no, especially when there’s a life … that we know we have to save.”
