Dwayne Martin was delivering mail recently when he smelled smoke, heard a smoke detector going off and realized his phone was too far away, in his truck.
The Alexandria, VA, letter carrier quickly located a neighbor in a nearby townhouse and asked her to call 911. Firefighters were able to extinguish the fire, caused by food left cooking on a stove, before it extensively damaged the residence and spread to adjacent homes.
The neighbor praised Martin in a note to the local customer services manager.
Without his help, “so many people would have been homeless,” she wrote. Thankfully he “was in the right place at the right time and responded as quickly as he did. He’s an awesome mailman that takes his job very seriously!”