A Bartholomew County Sheriff’s deputy who once served as a volunteer firefighter, accompanied by a new deputy, rescued a man from a burning home on the recruit’s first patrol shift.
Sheriff Matt Myers said everyone was proud of deputy Andrew Dougan, 26, who has been with the department about four and a half years, and the deputy he was training, Robert A. Cooper, 38, who was sworn in Sept. 4.
Cooper, a native of Franklin, is a U.S. Army retiree who joined the sheriff’s department after 20 years of military service. Dougan, originally from Greensburg, served for several years as a Greensburg volunteer firefighter and as an emergency medical technician for Batesville.
“It’s all about saving lives and what they did is really a big deal,” Myers said of the deputies’ efforts to rescue a man who had become disoriented and confused in the burning home.
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Describing Cooper as “my rookie,” Dougan said the two had a relatively quiet beginning to the shift, which began at 10:30 p.m. Monday. They were in Columbus when dispatchers sent them to a fire at 3:54 a.m. Tuesday at 7800 E. County Road 475S, near Elizabethtown.
Elizabethtown and Columbus Township firefighters were also sent to the home of Walter and Janet Pardieck, a couple in their 80s. Their daughter had called 911 reporting that smoke alarms were going off in her parents’ home and they were reporting heavy smoke and flames.
With lights and sirens, Dougan said the two deputies made it to the house within about 7 minutes and saw smoke coming from the home’s front door. They initially parked a little way down the road to leave room for fire trucks that would soon arrive.
Husband inside
Janet Pardieck was standing in the threshold at the front door, and deputies approached her and helped her away from the home and across the road to safety. They asked if her husband was still inside, and learned he was.
“We initially went into the front of the house and smoke was very thick,” Dougan said. “We were on our knees to get below it. But about 10 feet in, it was too thick, and I told Rob we needed to go back out.”
They approached a back door that led into the garage, and encountered more smoke, but could hear Walter Pardieck speaking as they entered.
“I told him to keep talking to me,” Dougan said.
He eventually found the man just inside the house at the garage entryway, gradually making out the man’s shape through the smoke.
“He was about 15 feet away, just inside the house from the garage, but the smoke was so thick we couldn’t see him,” Dougan said.
The deputies walked Walter Pardieck out through the garage, noting he was possibly suffering from disorientation after inhaling smoke.
Fire cause
As the rescue was almost completed, Elizabethtown firefighters arrived and determined a fire in a room with a wood stove was the cause of the smoke and some fire, Deputy Chief Doug Hollenbeck said.
Firefighters theorized that about a half rick of wood stacked next the wood stove caught fire, but a brick backdrop behind the stove prevented the home from sustaining severe damage, Hollenbeck said. He estimated damages at about $6,000.
Elizabethtown Fire Chief Tom Nienaber said firefighters used a fire extinguisher to put out the wood fire and then worked to haul the wood outside. The main damage to the home was from smoke and fire extinguisher material, which Nienaber said went everywhere through the home.
The Pardiecks suffered smoke inhalation, but refused further treatment from emergency medical technicians.
After leaving the home, Dougan said both deputies had burning eyes and throats, but they were concerned about the couple’s condition and how long they were in the smoke before they arrived.
“It doesn’t feel good; I’ve been exposed to smoke before. I knew he (Walter Pardieck) had been in the house longer than I had and I was worried about him,” Dougan said. “I didn’t want to wait for the firefighters. Because if it’s 2 or 3 or 4 minutes more, it might be too long. We needed to get him out.”
Dougan credited firefighters, who arrived about the same time the deputies were walking Walter Pardieck out of the home, for quickly getting the fire out.
While the deputies were on their work shifts, the volunteer firefighters were dispatched from their homes.
While he has been in smoke-filled homes before, Dougan said it was the first time he had saved someone in a structure fire.
Instinct kicks in
“At the time, I wasn’t thinking about it,” he said. “There was a little moment of panic when we went in the front and we couldn’t get to him. In those situations, every minute counts.”
The sheriff’s department does not require its deputies to enter burning buildings prior to firefighters’ arrival, but Dougan said it is common for deputies to do so if they aren’t going to injure themselves and there is a chance that someone is inside and needs help.
“I think most deputies would do the same thing,” Dougan said.
Dougan praised Cooper for his work at the scene, noting that the newcomer had spent time overseas as a military combat veteran, and had been exposed to similar things.
“He’s not a stranger to adrenaline,” Dougan said.
Dougan and Cooper plan to check in on the Pardiecks to see how they are doing.
Kelly Runge, the couple’s daughter, said her parents were shaken up by the incident.
“They are very grateful for the deputies for the timing of their arrival and their heroics going into the house,” Runge said.
Although Cooper’s first shift turned out to be outside the norm, his second shift the next day “wasn’t nearly that eventful,” Dougan said.
“That’s what I love most about the job — you never know what you will be doing. Even a boring shift can turn very exciting very quickly,” he said.
