DESTIN — Saturday night’s timeline is blurred for Dino Primofiore.
He knows he walked barefoot through glass, and when it was over went home to wash off another man’s blood.
Primofiore is one of a handful of neighbors who rushed to 704 Harbor Lane on Saturday night after hearing an explosion that shook his home.
“There were flames shooting in the sky, metal everywhere and glass,” Primofiore recalled Tuesday. “The women were yelling, ‘Get back!’ ”
Michael Todd Brower, a 37-year-old Illinois man, died at the scene.
Read Mr. Brower's obituary. >>
Dr. Luis Lopez, a much-loved Illinois pediatrician, remains in critical condition at Sacred Heart Hospital in Pensacola, according to hospital spokesman Mike Burke.
Brower’s uncle, John Brower, was in the house and suffered minor injuries.
The exact cause still is under investigation, but officials believe the fire was caused by a gas or vapor explosion in a sport utility vehicle parked in the driveway.
When neighbors heard the explosion, no one was sure what happened.
Primofiore quickly got dressed and left the house, not realizing until later he was barefoot.
“I approached a car that was in flames, a guy was walking in circles around it,” he said. “I’m trying to analyze it very fast.
“All of the sudden, you hear a person yelling, ‘Help me, help me.’ You can’t really tell where it’s coming from. He started yelling, ‘I’m burning.’ ”
Primofiore and several other men found Lopez near the left rear of the burning SUV and carried him toward the street.
Primofiore, who at 58 is the same age as Lopez, stayed with the doctor trying to keep him calm and conscious.
“We laid there as the scene was exploding and going off,” he recalled. “He was able to turn to me.
“He was able to tell me to keep him talking. He kept trying to get up. I wouldn’t let him.”
Paramedics took over when they got to the scene.
Primofiore remembers patting an emergency medical technician on the shoulder, telling him good luck and going home to wash off the blood before coming back to talk to officials at the scene.
He’s been “shook up” since the incident, worrying about what’s going to happen to Lopez.
“It was intense, very intense,” he said. “I’m huffing and puffing right now. To lay and be so close to one victim; I was inches away from his face trying to communicate with him.
“I just wish I was closer (to Pensacola), so I could go down, pay my respects, see him,” he said. “I think the community here did really good with what we had to deal with.”
Contact Daily News Assignment Editor Wendy Victora at 850-315-4478 or wvictora@nwfdailynews.com. Follow her on Twitter @WendyVnwfdn.