David Squillante and Doran Smith: Hero Rhode Island honeymooners rescue 20 babies trapped in burning nursery
BARCELONA, SPAIN: Newlyweds David Squillante and Doran Smith, both 38, are being hailed as heroes after the couple saved 20 babies from a burning nursery in Spain. The Rhode Island residents were going ahead as per their plan to take a park tour in Barcelona, on September 28 to celebrate their belated honeymoon. However, the couple was alarmed after hearing women’s screams from the flaming nursery entryway.
This prompted Squillante and Smith to rush in and help, “I just ran in and saw a bunch of babies sleeping and screaming," Squillante, who comes from a family of firefighters, told NBC News. Squillante explained that "instinct took over" as they jumped into action and ran straight up into the "smoky playroom". Smith, shared with Daily Mail, that she wasn’t sure how long the building had been ablaze, but to her, it seemed an "electric fire in the walls" was the cause of the fire. “It did seem like we walked by right when the chaos was starting though,” she claimed.
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Squillante immediately started placing 20 children into cribs while the visibility deteriorated with heavier smoke. He kept wheeling them out with the help of his wife at the same time tried calming the nursery staff. While reflecting on the incident Smith told Daily Mail, “The staff likely hadn't evacuated the building yet because there weren’t flames in the nursery. I think the staff was just trying to figure out where the smoke was coming from and trying to decide what to do.”
Smith, a software engineer, told the Boston Globe, “We couldn’t speak the language, but there was a universal language - we were all just trying to help.” The couple remembered how during their tour they looked at each other and said, “Remember that time we saved a bunch of babies?” Squillante, a food sales employee said to the Globe, “It felt like we watched it in a movie, it just didn't feel real.”
The couple got married in October 2020 but had to postpone their wedding until amid Corona pandemic until 2022. Smith recalled the selfless Squillante without a second thought went into that smoky building to help, and that made her realize he was someone to count on during an emergency.
Interestingly, Squillante's good Samaritan nature has helped many people, that includes one incident when he and a paramedic stopped a man from jumping over an overpass. And another time he went out in the rain to help find his friend’s missing dog and found a man passed out while on a bike ride, and the missing furry animal.