A 60-year-old St Joseph man who is on full disability doesn’t want to be called a hero, even though he kicked in the door of a neighbor’s burning home and helped rescue a four-year-old girl and her father.

Authorities say the fire broke out at 2304 Bryce Road shortly before two p.m. Monday.

Two men working in the neighborhood spotted the fire and helped usher the pair out of the smoke-filled house.

Witnesses say the father was just waking up in the front room. The rescuers had to locate the young girl in a back bedroom.

St Joseph Fire Department Inspector Steve Henrichson says the official cause of the fire remains undetermined. As the fire burned, the gas tank on a pickup truck in the carport ruptured and a natural gas line began feeding the flames. Henrichson says that cause a lot of damage at the point of origin in the carport area.

The house, its contents and the pickup truck were a total loss.

Henrichson says the father and the young girl were treated at the scene but refused hospitalization. One of the two men who rescued them went to the hospital later to be checked out, after suffering from apparent smoke inhalation.