Charlotteans walk for a cause Saturday

The greater Charlotte area played host to several important causes Saturday morning.

In south Charlotte, runners helped raise money to fight cancer at the Sarcoma Stomp.

The run-walk benefits research for the rare cancer which attacks the body's soft tissue or bone.

In uptown Charlotte, Channel 9 anchor Erica Bryant emceed the March for Babies walk.

One in 10 babies born in North Carolina are born too soon.

The March of Dimes organization works each day to change that heartbreaking statistic.

Then, in Pineville, dozens of runners hit the pavement in honor of a Pineville firefighter killed in the line of duty.

This was the second annual Richard Sheltra Memorial Run.

Sunday marks one year since Sheltra died after helping to put out a fire at a golf store in Pineville .

At the run, Sheltra's father thanked the community for its ongoing support.

“To look around and see all these people that have come out to help us fund the foundation and to honor and pay tribute and memorialize Richard is a wonderful thing,” Richard’s father Mike Sheltra said.

The family is raising money for Sheltra's foundation, which supports fire departments across our area.

The Sheltra family also received support from relatives of another fallen firefighter, Captain Bradley Long.

“We just work as hard as we can to honor our son and all the firemen’s memory. The firemen that have passed and the supporting firemen that’s still here fighting the fight,” Capt. Bradley Long's father Jerry Long said.

Cox Media Group