A woman and her baby are safe after a dramatic rescue on the second floor of a burning house.
KALAMAZOO, Mich. — A mother and her baby were rescued from a burning house in Kalamazoo, Mich., last week, thanks to a quick-thinking public safety officer who caught the baby after the mother threw the child from a second-story window into the arms of a police officer.
On May 15 at approximately 4:16 p.m., Kalamazoo Department of Public Safety (KDPS) crews responded to a working structure fire at a two-story residence. According to KDPS, the home is divided into three separate living units.
Dispatchers were called to a porch fire that trapped a woman and her baby inside a second-floor unit.
When first responders arrived, they found the porch on the right side of the building completely on fire. While assessing the building, crews found the woman standing in a second-story window on the left side of the home holding her child as smoke billowed from the building.
In body camera footage from an officer identified as Public Safety Officer Arnett, Arnett can be seen looking around the building for the woman and baby. Once he finds them, he can be heard encouraging the woman to kick the screen out of the window and throw the baby into his arms. The video then shows Arnett grabbing the child and turning his attention to getting the mother out as well. KDPS said the baby was released to a nearby equipment operator. A ground ladder was then raised to the window, allowing the mother to climb down to safety.
Both mother and baby were transported to a local hospital for precautionary evaluation. Neither man was injured.
Residents of two low-rise units evacuated themselves and were not injured.
KDPS said fighting the fire posed additional challenges because the interior stairs had been damaged by flames, forcing crews to use ground-level ladders to reach the second-floor porch.
Most of the fire was concentrated on the exterior right side of the home, but flames had spread into the attic. Firefighters removed portions of the roof edge and exterior siding to access hidden flames, and other crews removed portions of the interior ceiling to locate and extinguish remaining hot spots.
The cause of the fire remains under investigation.
