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Quick-Thinking Teen Hailed As Hero For Saving Firefighter's Son From Fast-Moving Blaze

RANCHO CUCAMONGA (CBSLA.com) — A Los Angeles City firefighter says he owes everything to a teenage boy who jumped into action and saved his son from a fast-moving fire.

The blaze erupted Tuesday at Jason Chapman's Rancho Cucamonga home on Reales Street while the firefighter was returning home from work.

"I'm coming down the driveway and then I just completely hopped the fence as fast as I could," said Matthew Hawker, the good Samaritan.

With her 5-year-old son trapped upstairs, Hawker heard Chapman's wife screaming for help from the back yard after the home erupted in flames.

"I broke the back sliding glass door and I went for a little less than minute because I couldn't see anything and then I came out out, found a ladder on the side of the house and put it on a bar that was outside up, climbed the ladder and then jumped to the balcony," Hawker said.

Once on the balcony, the 17-year-old grabbed the child, and they together climbed back down.

"I know there was a lot of dangers, like, I could've possibly lost my life, but at the moment, all I was thinking about was the boy," he said.

"It's incredible what he did," Chapman said. "It's good to see the young people have that much initiative to go out and just get the job done."

Chapman's wife was taken to a hospital with a broken leg after jumping 15 feet from the balcony hoping to catch her son.

His search-and-rescue dog named Boogie was crated downstairs and died in the blaze, which was possibly an electrical fire.

"She's been all over the country training," Chapman said of the dog. "Went to Hurricane Ike and Gustav in 2008 in Texas."

Chapman is calling Matthew a hero, but the teen says he stopped to do the right thing.

"I just went out there and did the best I could," Hawker said.

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