BLITZER: Incredible video from Fresno, California. It shows what some firefighters come up against and the lengths that other firefighters go to help strangers and each other. Sara Sidner has the story.</s>SARA SIDNER, CNN CORRESPONDENT: A terrifying moment. A firefighter climbs to the roof of a house to help put out a raging fire inside. Instead, he helplessly plunges into the inferno. The reaction from witnesses says it all.</s>UNIDENTIFIED MALE: People are shocked. The firefighter has just fallen into that hellish pit of fire.</s>SIDNER: Cell phone video captures the accident from multiple angles. Captain Pete Dern (ph) was attempting to vent the roof. It's a technique often used where a firefighter cuts a hole in the roof to release dangerous gases and smoke to make it safer for colleagues to fight the fire on the ground, or attempt a rescue. But in this case, it was the firefighter who need rescuing when the garage he's on collapses. Captain Dern is caught inside for several minutes before he's pulled out. He's conscious, but more than 65 percent of his body is burned.</s>UNIDENTIFIED MALE: The remains of his uniform, his charred uniform burnt. It tells the story just by looking at it, the hell he went through in those three minutes.</s>SIDNER: Captain Dern, a 25-year veteran of the Fresno fire department is alive, but relying on a respirator to breathe.</s>UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Very traumatic time for the fire service and for the friends of the fire department. We are family. Brothers and sisters. And as you can see here, we rally around each other.</s>SIDNER: Sara Sidner, CNN, Los Angeles.</s>BLITZER: We wish him only the best. That does it for us. The CNN special report, "SHOWDOWN IN INDIANA, THE BATTLE OVER RELIGIOUS RIGHTS," starts right now.
Firefighter Survives Falling Into Burning House.