LOUISVILLE, Ky. (WHAS11) -- A Camp Taylor firefighter talks from his hospital bed about falling through a burning floor into a basement of flames. It all happened Sunday night when Captain Michael Long responded to a house fire in Fairdale.
The entire inside of the house is destroyed; flames were shooting out the roof and windows. Firefighter Michael Long says when he went in the house and the floor collapsed, he was sitting in flames and says he thought his life was definitely over. As firefighters sprayed water on the burning house, Long lead the way to fight the flames shooting from the basement.
Long was trapped in the basement with fire all over him and around him. Long says “It’s a pain you've never felt a pain I don't wish on anyone to know. You’re burning alive.” Meanwhile Long's wife, Jerri, a Metro EMS worker arrived at the house, but left quickly to take another firefighter with heat exhaustion to University Hospital.
Jeri Long says “I heard over the radio they had a firefighter trapped, I didn't know it was him.”
Fellow firefighters, including his brother-in-law, who was right behind him, were yelling and screaming at Long to hang on. They managed to get a ladder to the basement and it was up to Long to find the strength to get out. He says “I started to try to climb up. I got two, I lost my grip, fell flat into the fire. I was so exhausted.”
On his third attempt, he did find the strength and pulled himself up the ladder and out of the flames. Jeri Long found out that it was her husband trapped when he was rushed to University Hospital and she has been at his side in the hospital's burn unit ever since.
Long says as soon as he is healed he will return to his job fighting fires. The fire started because the homeowners treated the basement floor with the chemical acetone, something sparked and ignited.
Long says he wants the family to know he isn't mad and he doesn't blame them at all. The Longs say they know how it feels to lose everything in a house fire because in 2008 the Longs’ house also burnt down.
