FL FFs Lauded for Helping Paralyzed Woman Stuck in Apartment

Aug. 9, 2023
The Fort Lauderdale crew carried her, her wheelchair and her belongings out of her 31st-floor apartment.

A woman says three Fort Lauderdale Fire Rescue personnel are her heroes after they pulled out all the stops to help her.

And, that meant carrying her, her wheelchair and her belongings out of a 31st floor apartment.

“I was literally stuck on floor 31,” Haleigh Rosa told WPLG, adding that floodwaters shut down the elevator. 

Firefighters developed an operational plan. 

“To either bring her down 20-plus stories to the next crossway to the other tower or go up 13 and get across to a working elevator bank so she can get out of the building,” Battalion Chief Garrett Pingol explained.

Up they went and back down they came, “with a hundred pounds on their back,” Rosa said with a laugh.

“The fact that they had the know-how, the problem-solving and the desire to go above and beyond, like they do every day, we’re proud of that,” Pingol said.

Rosa, paralyzed from the waist down following a car crash eight years ago, shared the ordeal on TikTok to thank the firefighters.

The clip has been viewed more than five million times. 

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