Passing by Clarksville, Ark. Volunteer Firefighter Saves Man

Feb. 04--CLARKSVILLE -- About 11:45 a.m. Dec. 12, Capt. Brian Pledger of the Clarksville Volunteer Fire Department just happened to be in his pickup near Crestwood Lane when a call came through about a structure fire.

Without hesitation, Pledger pulled over at a nearby car wash to listen for the address. Pledger then shot across the street to get to the fire at 2 Crestwood Lane, the home of Verlene Coleman, her son, Larry Kinman, and grandson, Tim Kinman.

"I was lucky like that -- that I pulled over where I did," Pledger said. "No other vehicles were coming."

Pledger was first at the scene. When he arrived, he saw Coleman, her grandson and the family's home hospice nurse standing in the front yard. He could see smoke coming from the back door, and when the nurse told him that 65-year-old Larry Kinman was still inside, he put on the bunker suit he had in his pickup and headed into the burning building.

The family told Pledger that Larry Kinman tried to extinguish the fire with a garden hose, so when Pledger went inside, he followed the hose to the southwest corner bedroom, where he found Kinman lying on the floor.

Kinman was still conscious but had difficulty moving. Pledger helped him up, flung Kinman's arm over his shoulder and got out of the burning house just as firefighters arrived.

"I'd have got him one way or another," Pledger said.

By the time EMS loaded Kinman into an ambulance, Pledger was helping to connect the fire hose to put out the flames. Kinman was taken to Johnson Regional Medical Center, where he was treated for smoke inhalation and released a few days later.

"He got smoke inhalation pretty bad, and if it wouldn't have been just two or three more minutes, then things would've been a lot different," Clarksville Volunteer Fire Chief Clark Gray said.

No one else received hospital treatment, including Pledger, who said he was just fine.

"We've got a staple gun; if he cuts himself or something, we just staple him up," Gray said. "Brian is one of those where he'll be in the middle of it -- if there's a house fire, he's there. He's not shy about getting them out."

Pledger, 39, grew up in Clarksville and has served as a volunteer firefighter for 15 years. His dad, Floyd, was a firefighter for more than 40 years and retired in July as fire chief at the Clarksville Volunteer Fire Department.

Pledger said he never really planned to be a volunteer firefighter, but all that changed after a car crash that put him in a coma for 15 days.

"I don't know anything about it except what people have told me," Pledger said. "All I know is I went out the window and slid 45 feet on the guard rail on my neck."

Pledger served as a sergeant in the Marine Corps from 1992-97, spending two years stationed with a deployable unit in Okinawa, Japan. He traveled to 18 different countries and spent time at Marine bases in Twentynine Palms, Calif., Denver and Hawaii, among others.

While home on leave from Okinawa in 1995, Pledger was involved in the car accident that nearly decapitated him.

"It was my birthday, and I woke up, and I went to the bathroom at my mom and dad's," Pledger said. "When I turned the light on, that's when I saw my scar, and I was like, 'What the hell happened?'"

Pledger spent two more years with the Marine Corps in Memphis before he was released on medical discharge. He returned home to Clarksville, where he joined the volunteer fire department and started work in construction at Sherwood Engineering and Construction, his brother-in-law's company.

Pledger has been married to his wife, April, for 11 years and has four children: Kendra, 20, Robert, 17, Dayven, 11 and Noah, 7.

At the Jan. 14 meeting of the Clarksville City Council, Mayor Billy Helms presented Pledger with a certificate of appreciation for rescuing Larry Kinman from his burning home.

"To me, he's a hero," Helms said. "I can promise a lot of people would spend a lot of time thinking about it, but then it might be too late."

Firefighters are still unsure what caused the fire, but Kinman's mother, Verlene Coleman, said restoration work is already being done and the family hopes to move back in sometime this month. In the meantime, Coleman said, the family has been living in a rental home.

Coleman thanked the Clarksville volunteer firefighters for reacting so quickly and for salvaging what they could of the home.

"Larry was trying to put the fire out with the water hose until the firemen got there," Coleman said. "I called 911, and they were there within six minutes. If they hadn't gotten there as soon as they did, the house would've completely burned down."

Coleman said she is particularly grateful to Pledger for saving her son and is glad to see Pledger gain recognition.

"He deserves it," Coleman said.