Mayor Zohran Kwame Mamdani: Good afternoon, everyone. Before I begin, I want to first thank Fire Commissioner Lillian Bonsignore for her leadership of this department. It is a pleasure to be back here at FDNY headquarters as we mark an extraordinary act of heroism. Earlier this week, severe thunderstorms ripped through New York City. The downpour filled our sewer systems, and flash flooding in Brooklyn and Queens left residents stranded and vehicles submerged in water. This storm hit our city fast. Two inches of rain fell in less than an hour. Not every New Yorker was able to get shelter. One of those New Yorkers was Carmen Pinto, the principal of P.S. 81, Thaddeus Stevens Elementary School in Bed-Stuy, whose car was trapped on the Jackie Robinson Parkway. Very quickly, the water started to rise. And very quickly, it began to fill her car. Carmen was running out of room to breathe. She tried everything. She tried to open up her car door. She tried to bring down her windows. She tried calling 911. Nothing was working fast enough.
By the time Travis Langan climbed atop her car, her face was pressed to the sunroof glass. Travis was off duty, but I know that I am here at a headquarters of so many New Yorkers for whom that term does not mean much. A room full of people whose commitment to this city is not measured by hours in a day, but frankly by a lifetime of service. Travis didn't hesitate. He punched the sunroof with his bare fist, made a hole, and pulled Carmen from the flooding car and to safety. Carmen is with us today, safe and dry in her favorite Jalen Brunson t-shirt. So too is Travis, whose wife is nine months pregnant and due any day now with their third child. It is an honor to reunite Travis and Carmen for the first time since Travis broke open that sunroof. Let's please give them a huge round of applause.
I want to take a quick moment to dwell on Travis' courage. Travis has devoted his life to service. Travis is a firefighter for Ladder 123 in Crown Heights. Before he joined the FDNY, he served our nation as a Marine. This is a man whose first instinct is to help, to protect, to serve and to save. On Wednesday night, he made a split-second choice. Because of his bravery, Mrs. Pinto will sit down to dinner with her family this evening. This kind of courage may be extraordinary for most, but it is frankly ordinary for the FDNY. Every day, members of the FDNY show that same courage across the five boroughs in ways that are so often unseen and unrecognized. None of you do this work for the acclaim. You do it because you love our city, you love the people who call it home, and because you have devoted yourselves to lives of service.
Thanks to that service, fires are extinguished, the injured receive care and our city is made safer each and every day. And thanks to that service, a school still has its principal, three children still have their mother, four grandchildren still have their grandmother, a community still has its light, and the New York Knicks still has one of their biggest fans. So, thank you to each of you in this room for answering the call every day when you're on duty and when you're off duty. And thank you once again to Travis for showing that even the strongest sunroof under the most intense amount of rainfall is still no match for the strength and the service of the FDNY. Thank you again Travis. Thank you. I will now pass it over to our next speaker.
Fire Commissioner Lillian Bonsignore: That would be me. Fire Commissioner Lillian Bonsignore, here to show our gratitude to this act of heroism. Travis was incredibly brave, saving Carmen's life in that one moment when she needed it the most. As the fire commissioner, I have the unique opportunity to be surrounded by thousands of Travises every single day. It is what they do. It is what's in their heart. It's what's in their soul. It's not about the uniform that they put on. They don't need it to be activated. They just need somebody who needs help and to be in the right place to give that help. We're so very proud of Travis, as we are of all of our first responders, whether you're sitting and working out of a fire truck or an ambulance, these are people that are here to save your lives, here to help you at your worst moments. And we take that with pride. And we will do that for the rest of our days because it is who we are, not just what we do. So, we're so very proud of you. Thank you so much for being such a great example. Thank you.
Travis Langan: I'm Travis Langan. I work in Ladder 123 in Crown Heights, Brooklyn. It was a crazy night. I left work a little late. Flash floods came down. I'd never seen rain that hard. I actually got on the phone with my father when I was under Jackie Robinson. And I'm like, "Dad, man, I've never seen anything like this." And as I'm coming to the end, everybody started like pushing me to the westbound exit to go westbound onto Grand Central. And I looked over, and there was six cars just basically submerged underwater. And I saw people getting out on the roofs. And I said, "Dad, I've got to give you a call back." I got out. I didn't grab anything. I just walked. I was going to say, you know, "Everybody get in the water, we've got to get to dry land." And I asked if anybody was trapped in their car. And they told me that she was. And so, I asked if anybody had anything to hit the window with. And everybody said that everything's, you know, pretty much underwater. So, I hopped on her roof. And I saw her face pressed up against the sunroof. And I just started punching my way through. And I got a big enough hole. And she actually handed me this Yeti cup. And I just started wailing away at the sunroof with the Yeti cup. And I started ripping the glass. And I'm able to get her head through. And I'm just very grateful that she came out alive.
Carmen Pinto: Good afternoon. Yes, I am short. Today, I am so happy and so blessed that I was sent an angel. Travis never thought of himself. He could have just driven home to his pregnant wife and his beautiful daughters. But he stopped. And he saw a situation. And he saw a way that he could help. And he didn't turn around to see if somebody else was going to step in. He just selflessly came and saw that I was about to be - I was about to be - I was about to drown in a trapped vehicle. And without thinking of his own well-being, he punched a hole in my roof and rescued me. And today I get to see the Knicks yet one more time. I get to go back to my school community in Bed-Stuy District 16. I'm doing the heavy lifting.
And I got to meet my favorite mayor. We finally have - I'm a history teacher at heart, always will be, so love my mayor. But more importantly, I think what we see here is that this is going to be a story that Travis' children are going to hear about the character of the man that is Travis. And I think it speaks to the fiber of the FDNY family, that you go in to burning buildings, you go into the most dangerous situations, looking at how you can save a stranger. And I think that is the beauty of living and working in a city like New York, that we have real superheroes. And coming from Queens, I'm proud that Spiderman is from Queens, but now he's got competition with Travis. We have a real hero in town. Thank you, Travis, for saving my life.
