Montreal hero who saved neighbours from fire will head home for Christmas

A little more than a month after a Lachine, Que., man ran into a burning building to save his neighbours, he’s awake and is making his daughter’s Christmas wish come true.

Paul-Henri Sylvain suffered serious burns and was placed in a medically-induced coma for two weeks to recover.

Now awake, the gym manager is slowly starting to feel like his old self again and is finally able to spend some quality time with his nine-year-old daughter, Eva.

Sylvain said that after waking up from the coma, everything was a blur.

“It took about two or three days to realize what had happened,” he said.

On Nov. 15, Sylvain woke to fire inside his home. His first instinct was to make sure all his neighbours exited the apartment building safely. After that, he ran back inside and tried to put out the fire.

In addition to the burns to his body, his lungs and airway were badly affected.

• READ MORE: West Island community rallies behind hero dad who ran into burning building to save neighbours

Sylvain doesn’t like to talk about the fire — and he doesn’t consider himself a hero.

“Well, I kind of laugh at the hero thing,” he said. “I think I did anything that anybody would have done. I’m just happy everybody was safe.”

His focus now is on healing and making up for the time he lost.

“I’m just really happy that I could take care of my daughter. That’s my most important thing, is that I’m able to take care of her,” he said.

As Sylvain recovers, he’s surrounded by friends and family, including his biggest supporter, Eva.

“I knew he was going to be OK. So I was not really, really, really worried, because I knew he was going to be OK,” she said.

All Eva wanted this Christmas was for her father to wake up and come home, but doctors couldn’t promise he would be well enough to be released by Christmas.

Clearly, they underestimated Sylvain.

“When I got out of bed, the nurses [said], ‘You can’t walk.’ And as soon as I left the room, I started walking on my own, like, slowly and surely,” he said.

While there’s still a long recovery ahead, Sylvain will leave the hospital on Christmas Eve, making his daughter’s wish come true.