(PUEBLO) — A Pueblo Transit employee saved two houses from burning down when he quickly jumped into action. This role is far from his normal duties of driving a bus for the City of Pueblo, and it’s not how he expected his morning to end up

The driver, Paul Trujillo, noticed heavy smoke coming from a neighborhood in Pueblo and pulled over his bus, carrying more than twenty passengers eager to get to their destinations. He immediately dialed 911 to report the fire but realized there was no time to waste. People in the area now say his heroism saved the entire neighborhood from going up in flames.

“Before I engaged, I didn’t really think about it; I just jumped into action because there was nobody outside,” said Trujillo.

On March 1, Trujillo began his day like any other, beginning with his first route around eight in the morning. Shortly into his drive, he began to notice smoke coming from a neighborhood not far from one of his stops. After deciding to follow the smoke, he saw large flames and a fence between two houses on fire off Chestnut Avenue.

“It just needed the situation needed to be addressed, so, there wasn’t really time to wait for something to happen,” he said.

He says his main focus was to get people out of the house.

“We began knocking on doors trying to wake up the families and the homes, both families were asleep when we got them up,” he said.

Once Trujillo alerted the family, he grabbed a fire extinguisher from the bus and was able to put out the flames and help from neighbors.

“Once we started banging and screaming and everybody out throughout the neighborhood got up and they brought their fire extinguishers, people collected hoses, and everybody helped out to get this fire out,” he said.

He said that despite all of the adrenaline, it felt like everything was moving in slow motion.

“It seemed like forever, I mean just pounding on the door seemed like it took an eternity to wake them up, but realistically maybe a matter of five minutes that it all occurred, that it all went down, everything from jumping out, calling for help, putting out the flames,” he said.

The two houses adjacent to each other belong to Evelyn English on the right side and her daughter, Terri Roberts, on the left. Roberts told FOX21 that she was taking responsibility for the incident.

“What had happened is that I had my ashes from a cigarette into the trash can. Well, it wasn’t all the way out. So, when I left to go out of town, it started a fire in the trash can, and it was burning the fence,” said Roberts.

That morning, she was in a rush to get to a hair appointment in Colorado Springs, which resulted in her quickly tossing her cigarette into the trash can. She said it was full of dry leaves, making it easy to catch on fire.

Since the incident, she said she has learned her lesson to never walk away from a cigarette again. She said she usually tosses them into the toilet but did not because of her rush that day.

“Don’t put cigarettes out in a trash can where this leaves and stuff, and if you do, make sure it’s out because I didn’t think this would happen to me,” she said.

Despite her mistake, she says she is incredibly grateful Trujillo did not just drive by.
“God bless you, Paul, and thank you. We are so grateful that my children are safe. Thank you so much,” she said.

Trujillo said that often, when people see something terrible happening, they tend to overthink and become bystanders.

“If you second guess yourself, then all kinds of thoughts are going to come through, you just have to do it. I mean, that’s just what happened,” said Trujillo.

After his quick pit stop that morning, he said his job must go on and people need to get to where they are going.

“They still had jobs in their lives to get on to. We were able to get all back in the bus, and we remained on time; no one was late for any transfers,” he said.