NORFOLK, Vir. – A Gwinnett County Navy sailor is being praised for saving two strangers from a burning apartment building in Virginia.

The two-alarm fire broke out at an apartment complex in Norfolk, Va., Tuesday afternoon and quickly spread throughout the building.

Electronics Technician (Nuclear) 1st Class Gabriel Journey was walking by when he heard a woman scream.

“The fire started in the bottom and spread so they were trapped,” Journey said WAVY.

He jumped out of the car and ran to help.

“There was a group of four other gentlemen who were there. I had them pick me up and I climbed up the side of the building and helped her out. It’s what I trained (for) on the job every day, so the number one priority was to get as many people out as quickly as possible,” Journey said.

Video shot at the scene showed Journey standing on a windowsill and lowering a woman and her son into the crowd.

“My thought processes were, someone needed help and someone had to take initiative. There were a lot of people there, but everyone was scared and it was very chaotic. I felt I had the ability to do something. I had the ability to intervene, so I did,” Journey told the Defense Visual Intelligence Service. “It was only after everything calmed down that I realized how close the fire was and how bad the situation could have been.”

He said he was grateful to be in the right place at the right time to help.

WAVY reports that two people were injured and more than 30 people were displaced by the fire, which officials believe was caused by “unattended cooking.”