JAMESTOWN, N.Y. — It started as a call to the Jamestown Fire Department.
"It was a nice night, we had just finished up dinner," said Battalion Chief Nate Alm from the Jamestown Fire Department.
An automatic alarm from downtown sent crews on their way.
"So we were responding to it. Our habits are we respond to it like it's an actual fire," said Alm.
This time, it actually was.
"[There was] smoke coming from the 7th floor. Reported my findings to all the responding units that [it] was actually a working fire. We could see the flames from the street," said Alm.
Flames were shooting from the Senior Citizen Apartments high rise as firefighters were working to swiftly knock down the blaze.
The person living in that 7th floor apartment where the fire started was found dead in his chair.
"Not a good feeling for us when somebody loses their life in a fire, because that's what we're here for is to help save and rescue people in situations like this, but unfortunately we weren't able to do that in this case," said Alm.
Others were hanging over the balcony, yelling for help to get out of the building, while their family members were running in to check on their loved ones.
"And this is when the police became involved because we needed manpower to get the people out of the building," said Alm.
Jamestown Police Department Lieutenant Matthew Bentley was nearby in his patrol car when the initial call for help came in.
"They believed that the fire was on the 7th floor and JFD was asking for assistance," said Lt. Bentley, who could see the smoke in the sky as he drove to the scene.
"And I knew at that point we had something serious going on," said Bentley, who called for additional police agencies and others to assist.
"At that point we realized we were going to have to evacuate everybody," he said.
Lt. Bentley entered the building and immediately took the stairs up to the 6th floor to organize a building-wide evacuation.
"It was very smokey. And it was very dense smoke, difficult to breathe, but we still went door to door," said Bentley.
He started knocking on doors as water was gushing from the ceiling tiles.
"We were just kind of working against time to get everybody else out as safe as possible. We had gotten the sixth through the second floor evacuated and by that time we were able to go up to the 8th and 9th floor," said Bentley.
Lt. Bentley got help that night from Jamestown Mayor Kim Ecklund, who also nominated him for the award.
Mayor Ecklund was just leaving City Hall that night when she got the call. She too rushed to the scene and headed for the stairwell to try and help with the rescue efforts.
"When I got here, things were already moving at a fast pace. Mr. Bentley was a driving force in making sure that people were rescued out to safety, carried down the stairs. He cares about the people, he had conversations with them on the way down," said Ecklund.
"Fear goes out the window and instinct kicks in. And I've never been trained to do a mass evacuation out of a building that is, or has, an active fire going on in it, however it was very comforting to know that everybody was on the same page with me and we were all working to one common goal," said Lt. Bentley.
Alm is also grateful for Bentley's effort in helping in the rescue, as many of the residents and their pets were placed in the rec room.
The Red Cross was called in to help those displaced from their apartments.
"Without much practice, without much pre-planning. We're able to get the residents of this building down to the first floor in to safety in a short period of time," said Alm.
As for the Red Cross recognition, Lt. Bentley says he's grateful, but humbled.
"This was an absolute shock when I heard that I had been awarded this. To me, it was a Monday night. It was a little bit more hectic of a Monday night than normal, but you never know when you're going to have to get called into action in this job," said Lt. Bentley.
"Yes, his overall duty was to get people out and help the fire department, but he was a good samaritan all the way through," said Ecklund.