Jerry Momon woke up in the

wee hours of last Wednesday morning after hearing a loud, constant banging

noise coming from across the street.

When he peeked out his window

to see the ruckus, he saw flames shooting out his neighbor's top floor

window and a woman frantically beating on the door and hollering to wake

up those inside.

Momon, a 23-year veteran Atlanta

firefighter who lives on North Creek Trail in east Fayette, "threw

on some clothes" and dashed across the street, worried that neighbor

Cheryl Mullikin was fast asleep and in serious danger.

He later learned that Cheryl

was out of town and her husband Mike, who was inside, was just becoming

aware of the flames. Momon relied on his vast firefighting experience

to use an everyday garden hose to put out the fire, which heavily damaged

the home's study, shooting flames into the ceiling.

Momon had to keep an eye out

on the ceiling to make sure the fire didn't reach the attic, which could

have caused a "flashover" and seriously hurt or killed him.

"Sometimes people would

be surprised what you could do with a real small one," Momon said

of the garden hose. "I was thinking I could keep it (the fire) down

as much as I could until the fire department got there."

He kept the water spray aimed

at the base of the fire instead of trying to wet the entire study, where

the fire erupted.

The smoke was thick, but he

kept to the floor so it was easier to breathe. "Three gulps of thick

smoke like that and you're going down," Momon said. It also got "pretty

hot," he added, particularly because he wasn't wearing any of his

protective firefighting gear at the time.

"The way that fire was

looking I just figured I didn't have enough time to put it on," Momon

said. "At that point I was worried about Cheryl, especially after

I had seen the flames kinda shooting out the window. I saw her car and

I was thinking, she wouldn't be able to get out."

Mike Mullikin also helped out

more oxygen to feed on," Momon noted.

If Momon hadn't acted quickly,

the Mullikins might have lost their entire house and not just the study,

which housed his computer, library and 25 years worth of model tanks in

addition to other memorabilia. Some of the items may actually be saved

with a little cleaning up thanks to Momon's quick response.

The Mullikins were very appreciative

of Momon's efforts.

"He did a super job,"

said Cheryl Mullikin.

"He was very professional

and he took care of the problem," her husband added.

Momon insists he was just being

a good neighbor and doing what he was trained to do.

"They're good people.

I tried to do anything I could to help," Momon said.

Mullikin was also appreciative

of the woman who tried to alert her husband to the fire by banging on

the door and shouting. The woman left the scene before the Mullikins could

get her name, but they found out later that the woman was Lori Nyman,

a sister of one of their neighbors in the subdivision.

The fire started from a wastebasket

where Mike Mullikin had just emptied an ashtray next to the computer,

he said.

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