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The thing about ‘Stop, Drop, and Roll’ that was drilled into our heads back in elementary school is we were all led to believe that this was a tactic we’d be using regularly throughout life. I’ve never had to Stop, Drop, and Roll at any point during my years on earth and to be honest, I don’t know a single person who has.
I think the more useful tactic to drill in our adolescent brains would’ve been ‘haul ass away from fire’ by teaching us to walk, run, or climb our way to safety. This dude who went viral last night escaping a fire in West Philly climbed down 19 FLOORS to safety in an effort to escape the suffocating smoke.
The footage is pretty outlandish. He is a real-life Spider-Man who scales down the 19-floor apartment building with relative ease.
I don’t even want to think about what might’ve happened if his hands started sweating or he grabbed a loose brick at some point especially since it was nighttime and visibility was low.
HIGH-RISE FIRE: A man is seen scaling down a 19-story apartment building after a fire in West Philadelphia.https://t.co/Rmujuv7vsb pic.twitter.com/2NsXXYgJVL
— Action News on 6abc (@6abc) July 19, 2019
Heavy police and fire presence at 4400 Holden in West Philadelphia. Reports of flames and heavy smoke, at one point several residents were trapped @6abc pic.twitter.com/DB5XQJZUBy
— Christie Ileto (@Christie_Ileto) July 19, 2019
If I’m one of those bystanders then I’m asking him for autographs when he gets down so I can sell those on the streets of Philly after this guy goes viral.
Man who scaled down West Philadelphia building to escape fire immediately greeted by police at ground pic.twitter.com/c1RnBwK3Cu
— Matt Simansky (@ActionNewsMatt) July 19, 2019
#UPDATE officials tells @6abc fire started as a trash fire on the first floor and traveled up the trash shute to the upper levels, then causing heavy smoke to pour into he hallways. Fire is out.
— Christie Ileto (@Christie_Ileto) July 19, 2019
Spider-Man’s new outfit sucks
— Billy Drinkington (@BDrinkington) July 19, 2019
“West Philadelphia, burned and razed”
— Hash (@Hashzilla) July 19, 2019
It seems like everyone on Twitter made the ‘Spider-Man’ connection as there were thousands of GIF + pic responses. My favorite response was this one:
Y’all just gonna shine that bright ass light in his face
— YO (@foreignswish) July 19, 2019
I get the sentiment here, it wouldn’t be great to blind the guy, but they were clearly shining the light on him so that he could see what he was doing since it was nighttime.
Sadly, I’m wondering how many people could even pull this off these days. I’m not naming names but so so SO many people are out of shape. The adrenaline would be pumping but would that be enough for a 30-year-old to be able to climb down if they haven’t exercised in a decade?
I don’t know how I decided to somehow make this about getting healthy but I can’t shake the thought that this person might’ve choked to death on smoke if they weren’t in shape. Makes me want to go for a run right now even though I hit the gym last night.