Dramatic fiery rescues highlight this year's Harold J. "Whitey" Swartz Valor Awards.
Firefighters and police officers from several towns are being honored Wednesday for their life-saving efforts.
Seven firefighters also will be honored for their 50-plus years of service.
The Margate City Fire Department is hosting the ceremony at the Anthony “Tony” Canale Fire Training Center in Egg Harbor Township.
The following will receive Certificates of Valor: Class One.
Firefighters arrived at a four-story rooming house on South Georgia Avenue on July 11, 2024, to see flames coming out of several windows.
Firefighter Joseph Reitzler climbed a ladder four floors to rescue a resident from the 100-year-old wood-frame building.
"Our main man Joseph Reitzler making the city of Atlantic City and Atlantic City Professional Firefighters Local 8 proud with a save," Union President John Varallo wrote in a Facebook post that day.
Pomona and Germania volunteer firefighters were dispatched to a working fire with thick black smoke at a mobile home off Pomona Road just before 8 a.m. July 19, 2025.
While en route, they got word that there might be an entrapment.
Pomona Lt. Matthew Dempsey and Firefighter Shane McNew initiated an interior search without a hose line, and found a man unconscious in the bathroom.
The two firefighters worked together to get the man out.
"Volunteer firefighters rarely get 'saves.'" Chief Gary Dooner Jr. wrote in a post about the save at that time. "You’re fighting uphill: responding from home, from jobs, from family event; often delayed by dispatch systems optimized for law enforcement, underfunded compared to paid departments. But when a volunteer crew makes that save, it’s monumental. The pride, the bond, the raw fulfillment as an officer knowing your team made that difference, there’s no way to describe it."
Cardiff and Farmington volunteer fire companies had been dispatched to a structure fire at a home on the Black Horse Pike on Oct. 2, 2025.
But before firefighters arrived, the fire was spreading and so was worry.
The homeowner was believed to still be inside, and no one could get in.
Egg Harbor Township Police Officers Gary Johnson and Chad Fraser forced their way in and yelled for the elderly woman without answer.
Her bedroom door then was kicked in, waking the startled and scared 82-year-old woman lying in bed, unaware of the flames engulfing her home.
The officers carried her to safety.
Oceanville and Bayview volunteer firefighters were dispatched to Waterview Drive in Smithville on Dec. 10.
Assistant Chief Chuck Uhl arrived to find heavy fire coming from the condo, and neighbors saying the resident was still inside.
Firefighters Nicholas Stewart and John Parker went inside and searched through heavy smoke and fire before finding the man on the second floor. The 60-something resident was unconscious.
The firefighters carried him down the stairs to a waiting Galloway Township Ambulance Squad.
He then was flown to Temple University in Philadelphia.
Those being honored for having served 50-plus years in the fire service are:
