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Florida man stops to put out fire at neighbor's house during lunch break
A man in Merritt Island, Florida was on his lunch break when he spotted a fire at a neighbor's house and decided to hop the fence and put it out himself.
MERRITT ISLAND, Fla. - A Merritt Island man was on his lunch break when he spotted a fire at a neighbor's house and decided to hop the fence and put it out himself.
24-year-old Michael Edens was driving home during a lunch break at his job at Publix when he saw smoke coming from a home about a block away.
He ran up and knocked on the door, but when no one answered, he jumped over the fence to go start putting out the fire.
"I was coming home, and I just happened to see smoke over my house," Edens said. 'I thought it was my house."
With part of the home's back patio still smoldering, Edens was still able to take a video as he continued to spray it with a garden hose he found nearby.
When he first got there, he says the flames were touching the roof.
"I just didn’t want it to spread into other people’s houses, so I just went over there," Edens said. "You hear about it, you see videos, I’ve seen firefighters put out fires. I’m not a firefighter, I just did what I saw in the videos."
Edens says it only took him about five minutes to put out the fire, and it wasn't long before the fire department showed up.
He later realized there was one person inside when the fire started, but they were able to get out safely.
Edens told FOX 35 he's never been in a situation like that before, but he hopes he wouldn't hesitate to do the same thing again.
"I just wanted to help," Edens said. "I would do it for anybody. It doesn’t matter if it’s a fire or anything."