The Carnegie Hero Fund Commission awards the Carnegie Medal to individuals from throughout the United States and Canada who risk themselves to an extraordinary degree saving or attempting to save the lives of others. The Carnegie Medal is considered North America’s highest civilian honor for heroism.
Among the resipients of this quarter’s Carnegie Medal recipients is Suffolk County (New York) police officer Sean Patrick Kalletta.
Offier Kalletta responded to a Jan. 2, 2021, house fire in Selden, New York, where a couple remained inside the home while attempting to gather their frightened dogs.
When Kalletta, 26, learned that people were inside the home, he ran into the home to the kitchen, where he told Debra M. Baker, 51, and Robert J. Baker, 55, that they needed to leave the house immediately. Debra Baker took one dog and left the home, but Robert Baker refused to leave without the other dog.
Kalletta reached down toward the dog, but it bit him. Smoke filled the kitchen. Flames grew and spread toward the kitchen. Kalletta pushed the man out of the house through a back door.
He and another officer then helped the Bakers and one of the dogs over a fence to safety.
The second dog was removed from the house and survived.
Kalletta was treated at a hospital for smoke inhalation and the dog bite. No one was burned.