An elderly couple in Missouri is safe after being rescued by police who responded when a Pop-Tart caused a fire in their home.
Bill and Peggy Cruse faced the scary situation on Dec. 9 when police say two officers responded to a house fire.
Cpl. Travis Detring of Ellisville Police told NBC News-affiliate KDSK he was first on the scene.
“I responded to the scene, met one of the residents at the door who was frantic,” he said.
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According to Detring, he told Peggy to leave the house safely before he started to go through the burning home. The fire in the kitchen could be seen on his body cam.
In a bedroom at the rear of the home, Detring found Bill, who was in a wheelchair.
At that point, Detring’s partner Chris Annis arrived.
Annis said he heard Detring calling from the bedroom that there was someone who needed assistance getting out of the home.
Video shows the two working to lift Bill out of his wheelchair.
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“He (Annis) grabbed his legs and we were like, we gotta get out of here,” Detring said.
Speed was crucial, police say, because in less than two minutes following the rescue the bedroom was “completely black with smoke” when the fire department entered the home.
Cruse said in an interview the fire started suddenly after she was in the process of cooking Pop-Tarts.
She said as she was removing the pastry, it broke it half with part of it staying in the toaster.
“I was looking at it thinking, how am I going to get that out of the toaster? And before I knew it, flames shot out of that line of fruit that you could see,” Peggy explained.
As soon as the flames broke out, she called 911 and later said emergency officials were there in about two minutes.
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Peggy was thankful for the speed they responded because she wasn’t sure she would have been able to get Bill out of the house.
“They’re very brave people,” she said of Detring and Annis. “Who wants to walk into a fire?”
Bill added that all the emergency officials were “great.”
Family members say there was extensive smoke and fire damage to the kitchen and other parts of the home, but they’re thankful the couple survived the fire.