Jeffrey Tanner

Jeffrey Tanner rescued Cynthia A. Chambery from burning, Lima, New York, November 9, 2021. Chambery, 67, was in a bedroom of her one-story house when flames broke out in the basement. Tanner, 48, technical solution manager, was at his house nearby when he saw smoke coming from the residence. Tanner responded, and saw flames coming from the garage. Chambery’s husband alerted Tanner that Chambery was in the bedroom. Seeing conditions were too dire to enter through the front door, and with no other safe entry available, Tanner got permission from the husband to use a tractor to break through the bedroom wall. Tanner rushed home for his tractor and a sledgehammer, and came back to Chambery’s house. Reaching the bedroom, he used the tractor’s front-end loader to strike the bedroom’s exterior wall several times until he broke through. He then struck the interior wall with his sledgehammer until he created a hole large enough for him to enter the bedroom. Smoke limited visibility inside, and Tanner retreated to ask Chambery’s husband where her bed was located. Finding the bed was against the wall he had broken through, Tanner reached inside and pushed it a few feet to make more space to enter. He then crawled inside on his hands and knees. He felt Chambery’s hand, then shone his cell phone flashlight and saw Chambery was unconscious with her upper body hanging off of her bed. He grasped her arm and pulled her from the bed to the floor. Tanner positioned her to lay on her stomach, grasped her about her shirt and shorts, and crawling, moved her toward the opening. He climbed through the opening as he pulled her from behind until she was on the ground outside the house, and Tanner rolled her onto her back. A state trooper arrived, and he and Tanner moved Chambery from the house and the trooper performed CPR on her until an ambulance arrived. Chambery was taken to a hospital, but she had died from smoke inhalation. Tanner sustained burns to his arm and was left with scarring.