It was a very early Saturday morning in November 1986, when Dan Sullivan said he arrived on the scene of his first fire as a new Quincy firefighter. And it was a bad one.
The blaze was a two-alarm fire at a single family home in North Quincy at 28 Milton Road. When firefighters arrived, a mother and her newborn daughter were trapped inside the house. Without hesitation, Sullivan and other Quincy firefighters raced into the burning building to rescue them. Sullivan carried 3-week-old Paige Lentini out of the home while smoke poured out of the dwelling.
Sullivan and Lentini reunited last week, nearly 33 years after he saved her life, to celebrate his retirement.
“It was amazing ... it was an unbelievable experience to get to talk to her about it,” Sullivan said. “It felt great talking to her, I’ve never had a feeling like that before in my life.”
Sullivan said they had met in passing twice in the past three decades, but never had a chance to talk about the rescue.
“She was very interested in talking about the fire,” Sullivan said. “She wanted to know everything.”