LIVE OAK, Fla. — When a man was trapped in a burning house Sunday morning, three Live Oak police officers sprung into action.

After arriving to 615 Spruce Street around 7:30 a.m. Sunday, officers Ryan MacFadden, Jason Rhoden and Lucas Smith saw smoke coming out of the apartment house.

Rhoden made contact with a resident in the first door on the building, before helping MacFadden and Smith at the next apartment.

“They said they heard someone saying, ‘Help, I can’t get out,’” Rhoden said. “That’s when I told them to kick the door in.”

Once MacFadden broke through the door, the officers found Sandy Chaires Jr. trapped under some furniture on the floor.

MacFadden and Smith grabbed Chaires’ hands and pulled him from the burning building.

“The room was so smoked out, you couldn’t see your hand in front of you,” said MacFadden, who was driving down Ohio Avenue moments earlier when a car flagged him down with flashing lights to alert the officers of the fire.

“Initially when we kicked the door in … all we could hear was his voice.”

Moments after the officers helped Chaires out of the house, the Live Oak Fire Department arrived and extinguished the fire after responding to the LOPD officers’ call to dispatch about the fire.

Assistant fire chief Sidney Hayes said the fire was started in the kitchen with a pot on the stove. He said Chaires, who had worked the night before, was going to cook but fell asleep.

According to Hayes, the fire was contained to the kitchen area and the bathroom, which was next door. However, the entire residence sustained smoke damage.

Chaires, however, sustained only minor injuries and smoke inhalation. He was transported to Shands Live Oak Regional Medical Center but was released and is fully recovered.

Smith said it was just a matter of the officers doing their job.

“As soon as we realized what was going on, we all just pretty much went into what we would call work mode,” Smith said. “Just try and make sure anybody that was inside was out, so they could presumably be safe or safer than the conditions that they were in.

“Just thankful that nobody got significantly hurt.”

MacFadden agreed.

“It was that time,” he said. “We had to go in.

“Ultimately, that’s what we’re here to do is protect and serve.”