Firefighters Praised for Saving Photo Albums From Burning Home

A firefighter carries photo albums from a burning home in Los Angeles in an act of kindness.

Firefighters in Los Angeles have been praised for saving photo albums from a house that was burning down and couldn’t be saved.

Reporter Karma Dickerson was on the scene for NBC at the house on Lachman Lane in the Pacific Palisades when fire consumed the property “in a matter of minutes” and says that the firefighter realized immediately that the home couldn’t be saved.

But in an act of compassion, firefighters began gathering the belongings of the people whose home it was and started carrying them outside to the relative safety of the street. When Dickerson asked what it was they were doing, the firefighters said they were “trying to save something, trying to do what we can. Maybe this will give them a little bit of comfort.”

A clip shows the firefighters entering the home, which is burning so badly that the flames are jumping well above the roof, and walking out with their arms full of photo albums. “Just trying to save some photos,” says one of the brave firemen. They also carried out other keepsakes like a grandfather clock and other antiques.

Stacks of photo albums on the street.

The firefighters also carried out other keepsakes such as this grandfather clock.

“I was watching them carry out family’s keepsakes. It was pretty extraordinary for them to make that a priority understanding that the house would likely be lost,” Dickerson says.

“Apart from the people and animals in the houses, photos are the most important things, in my opinion,” writes one person on Instagram. However, another commenter urges people to save photos in a “cloud or thumb drive” so as not to put the lives of first responders in danger.

The Palisades Fire, the largest of the L.A. fires, has burned through more than 23,700 acres and has killed at least eight people so far, according to The Washington Post. Los Angeles Fire Department Chief Kristin Crowley says the fire has destroyed more than 5,300 buildings. Only 13 percent of the fire is contained and it is spreading toward toward Brentwood, where the Getty Center is located, and is threatening to reach Interstate 405.