by Ryan Strong Sarah Armaghan and Corky Siemaszko
Moving through A sea of fire, Firefighter Peter Demontreaux felt the heat building on his face as he led a terrified man through a burning apartment to an escape window early Monday.
It was only after he helped lower the man to safety that Demontreaux realized that he was on fire.
"Everything happened so fast," the 28-year-old Staten Islander said. "I looked up and I was engulfed in flames."
Demontreaux's fellow firefighters quickly blasted him with water.
"Pete was on fire everywhere," said Firefighter Richard Myers. "I thought Pete was dead."
But Demontreaux was just delayed.
As soon as they doused the flames eating at his jacket and boots, he resumed searching the Brooklyn brownstone - oblivious to the first-degree burns on his face and second-degree burns on his back.
"We were all trained for stuff like this, so I didn't panic," he said afterward. "I really didn't think about anything besides helping those people."
It was a happy ending to a fire that left four firefighters and nine civilians injured - none seriously.
Witnesses said Demontreaux wasn't the only hero of the Bedford-Stuyvesant blaze. They said another firefighter threw himself on a burning man to douse the flames.
"He was on fire, so the firefighter threw himself over the man," said Jano Baptiste, 41, who lives across the street from the torched building. "He was very brave for what he did, trying to save that man."
Meanwhile, police were investigating reports that the building at 175 Putnam Ave. was set ablaze by thugs trying to finish off a man who survived a shooting earlier in the week, sources said.
"Last week, a man who lives there got shot right in front of the building," said Baptiste. "He took one bullet right in his neck. Someone's after this man."
The fire erupted a little before 4:30 a.m., and the building was engulfed by the time Ladder 132 arrived, Fire Chief Joseph Pfeifer said.
Demontreaux went up to the fourth floor and began working his way back in search of victims.
"There was fire everywhere," he said. "Floor to roof. All I thought about was the other people in that house."
After a few minutes, he said, "I found one man."
"He was in the back near a window, trying to get air," he said. "It kept getting hotter but he was still alive. We grabbed arms and made our way out of there."
A survivor from the third floor named Henry described being roused from his bed by flames - and being rescued by a firefighter who suddenly materialized in the smoke.
"I have smoke detectors, but I didn't hear them go off," he said. "By the time I opened the door, the flames were shooting through and I couldn't get out."
"I went around to look for my friend, but there was just too much smoke so I ran to the window and just waited for the fire department."
Henry said after a firefighter plucked him from his window, the smoke eater went inside to save his buddy.
With Rocco Parascandola
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