On November 30, 1989, Mr. Lastiwka rescued a woman from a burning house in St. Catharines, Ontario. Seeing smoke in his apartment, he went to warn the occupant of the adjacent unit, the source of the fire. Mr. Lastiwka crawled inside the smoke-filled rooms, found the woman unconscious on the floor, dragged her outside and carried her to safety. When the victim told him her son was still inside, Mr. Lastiwka attempted to re-enter the apartment but was driven back by the dense smoke. He provided the arriving firefighters with directions to help them find the boy.