ST. LOUIS – In a scary moment on Thursday morning, a St. Louis City firefighter partially fell through a floor on the second story of a building during a fire. Fortunately, that firefighter was not seriously hurt.

The scene unfolded just before 7:00 a.m. at an abandoned home on Palm Street just east of Union and south of Natural Bridge in the Kingsway West neighborhood of north St. Louis. Captain Garon Mosby with the St. Louis Fire Department said that crews at a nearby firehouse noticed smoke in the area. They responded and discovered the fire at the abandoned home.

Mosby shared that the first crews at the scene called the fire in to get a larger response. Mosby told FOX 2 that crews went inside to make sure no one was in jeopardy or needed to be rescued. He added that crews noticed holes in the floors, which certainly raised concerns about the condition of the building. Crews later found out after they were already inside the building that it had a high probability of collapse. That determination was made after a past inspection by firefighters.

While fire crews were inside the building, one firefighter ran into trouble.

“One of our firefighters on the second floor landing searching for hidden fire fell through the floor,” Mosby explained. “When you fall through the floor, instinctively, I can’t explain why it happens, but you spread out, which is what he did. We always work in teams, so there were other firefighters with him. They made the radio call that they had a downed firefighter but helped him and got him to safety.”

Mosby added, “He’s fine. He was evaluated, vitals taken, probably some bumps and bruises that are consistent with falling through a floor, but he returned to duty, and he’s back on the truck.”

That firefighter was not transported to the hospital. However, Mosby revealed that after the firefighter was hurt, all the other firefighters were evacuated from the building, and they fought the fire from outside the abandoned home.

An official cause of the fire is still under investigation. FOX 2 will update this story with more information as it becomes available.