Raymond Pollard, 51, was trapped on the top floor of a four-story building in Downtown Brooklyn by a fast-moving, three-alarm blaze, officials said.
But Pollard, a 24-year veteran, hooked his new rope - known officially as a "Personal Safety System" - to a window and climbed out. He was rescued moments later.
The brownstone building's roof eventually collapsed.
"Without the [new] equipment, within seconds, he would have been killed up there," said Chief Stephen Raynis of the department's Safety Battalion.
The new gear was introduced to prevent a repetition of the January 2005 tragedy, when two firefighters were forced to jump from a blazing building to avoid the smoke and flames, and were killed.
Republished with permission of The New York Post.