When Derrick Byrd's eight-year-old niece Mercedes got trapped on the second floor of their burning home, he told her to jump out the window and promised to catch her. The young girl was too scared to jump, so Byrd knew his only option was to run back into the house to get her out.
"She was screaming my name," Byrd told KOMO News from the hospital. "So I wasn't just going to let her sit there. I wasn't going to let my niece die."
He battled through the flames, which left him with second and third-degree burns and managed to find Mercedes hiding upstairs. He picked her up, covered her face with his shirt, and ran back outside.
"And I just ran up the stairs and pushed through the fire," he said. "I could feel it burning me. I got her and took my shirt off and put it around her face so she wouldn't breathe in any smoke and I just carried her out as fast as I could."
Byrd said he doesn't mind his severe injuries, or the pain they are causing him because he was able to save her life.
"Even though I got burnt," Byrd said. "I really didn't care, though. I'd rather get burnt than her. She's young. She's still got a lot of stuff going for her. She's a good kid."
Fire officials are still trying to determine what caused the fire, which completely destroyed the family's home and all their belongings. They called it a miracle that everybody inside survived and praised Byrd's heroic actions for risking his life to save his niece.
"I can't say a hero," said Byrd. "I'd just say for my niece and nephews, I wasn't going to let them die."