Watch N.Y. Police Officer Smash Sunroof to Save Woman in Burning Car
What to know
- Chester Police Officer Nicholas Contino and a bystander rescued a 68-year-old woman trapped from a burning rollover crash.
- The two were able to break the sunroof and pull the woman inside to safety.
- The woman was rushed to the hospital in stable condition with burns over a third of her body, and the department praised Contino’s decisive actions, which significantly improved the victim’s chances of survival.
By Nora Mishanec
Source Times Union, Albany, N.Y.
CHESTER, NY — Dramatic police body-camera footage showed a Chester police officer and a bystander rescuing a trapped woman from her burning car in Orange County.
The video footage taken from a camera worn by Officer Nicholas Contino shows Contino and the unnamed bystander sprinting toward the fiery crash site on Kings Highway near Knapps View Park in the town of Chester around 4 a.m. Sunday.
The woman became trapped when her vehicle rolled over and burst into flames, Chester's Police Department said Monday in a statement accompanying the released footage. Contino, the first officer to arrive at the site, gave his fire extinguisher to a passing driver who had stopped to help. The video footage shows the bystander using the fire extinguisher to spray the vehicle with flame retardant.
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Contino can be heard telling another emergency responder that he has a tool to break the window before asking, "Which window? Where's she at?"
Contino then smashed the car's glass sunroof and pulled it off the vehicle before grabbing the woman's T-shirt to pull her to safety with the assistance of the bystander and paramedics.
"We got you, we got you," the bystander tells the woman.
The driver, a 68-year-old resident of Warwick, suffered burns on a third of her body, police said. Paramedics took her to Westchester Medical Center's burn unit, where she remained hospitalized Monday in stable condition.
The department commended Contino for leading the rescue, which officials said "greatly increased the motorist's chances for survival."
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