{"id":20874,"date":"2026-08-13T05:08:05","date_gmt":"2026-08-13T05:08:05","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/poland\/20874\/"},"modified":"2026-08-13T05:08:05","modified_gmt":"2026-08-13T05:08:05","slug":"poland-hero-neighbours-use-blanket-to-catch-toddler-who-fell-from-fifth-floor-balcony","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/poland\/20874\/","title":{"rendered":"Poland: Hero neighbours use blanket to catch toddler who fell from fifth-floor balcony"},"content":{"rendered":"

Dramatic CCTV footage shows the moment three men catch a toddler in a blanket after the girl fell from a fifth-floor balcony.<\/p>\n

The miraculous improvised rescue occurred in the city of Lomza in northeastern Poland on Sunday afternoon, Polish news outlet TVP World reports.<\/p>\n

Emergency services had received a report of a child hanging over a balcony. <\/p>\n

\"Hero<\/p>\n

Seeing the girl clinging to the edge of the building, neighbours rushed to help before first responders arrived.<\/p>\n

The footage shows three men stretching out a blanket to catch the girl, who survived with only minor bruises.<\/p>\n

\u201cThanks to their quick response, a tragedy was avoided,\u201d police spokeswoman Karolina Wojciekian said. <\/p>\n

One of the neighbours who rushed to help, Dariusz Plonski, told Radio Bialystok, \u201cWhen I came out of the building, I heard people screaming.<\/p>\n

\u201cI looked up and saw the child, who was almost naked and wearing only a shirt. The girl was moving from one side of the railing to the other.<\/p>\n

\u201cI shouted at her not to move, but she did not respond.<\/p>\n

Mr Plonski said the rescue happened in the blink of an eye. <\/p>\n

\u201cIt was a matter of seconds,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

\u201cWhen I looked up again and saw that the child had moved to another spot, we barely had time to move into position so she would fall onto the blanket.\u201d<\/p>\n

The girl\u2019s mother was asleep at the time of the incident while her father was working overseas, police said.<\/p>\n

She was later found to have a blood-alcohol level of 0.07 (70mg alcohol per 100ml of blood), which is considered a mild to moderate level of intoxication.<\/p>\n

In Poland, the legal driving limit is extremely strict at 0.02. In Australia, the legal limit is 0.05.<\/p>\n

Investigations are ongoing.<\/p>\n

If the mother is charged with putting the child at risk of death or serious injury, she could face up to five years in prison, according to TVP World.<\/p>\n

frank.chung@news.com.au<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Dramatic CCTV footage shows the moment three men catch a toddler in a blanket after the girl fell…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":20875,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[13139,13091,13144,13088,13092,13084,13128,13124,13094,13131,13079,13123,13110,13108,13116,13096,13136,13093,13118,13112,6651,13142,13135,13122,13080,13099,13107,13103,13078,13111,13137,13082,13104,13090,13133,13086,13106,13105,13097,13138,2511,13113,9,5640,13098,13127,13114,3342,13121,13140,13087,7444,13119,13132,13100,13115,13130,13125,13109,13117,13085,13143,13134,13083,13126,13081,13095,13120,13129,13145,13101,13102,13141,13089],"class_list":["post-20874","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-poland","tag-s-mother","tag-0-02","tag-0-05-investigations","tag-0-07","tag-100ml","tag-70mg-alcohol","tag-a-balcony","tag-a-blanket","tag-a-blood-alcohol-level","tag-a-child","tag-a-fifth-floor-balcony","tag-a-matter","tag-a-mild-to-moderate-level","tag-a-report","tag-a-toddler","tag-a-tragedy","tag-afternoon","tag-an-eye","tag-another-spot","tag-arrived-the-footage","tag-australia","tag-blanket","tag-blood","tag-dariusz-plonski","tag-death-or-serious-injury","tag-dramatic-cctv-footage","tag-fifth-floor-balcony","tag-first-responders","tag-five-years","tag-her-father","tag-hero-neighbours","tag-intoxication-in","tag-lomza","tag-matter","tag-neighbours","tag-northeastern-poland","tag-northereastern-poland-seeing","tag-one-side","tag-only-a-shirt","tag-only-minor-bruises","tag-people","tag-plonski","tag-poland","tag-police","tag-police-spokeswoman-karolina-wojciekian","tag-polish-news-outlet-tvp-world-reports-emergency-services","tag-position","tag-prison","tag-radio-bialystok","tag-risk","tag-seconds","tag-sunday","tag-the-blanket","tag-the-blink","tag-the-building","tag-the-child","tag-the-city","tag-the-edge","tag-the-girl","tag-the-incident","tag-the-legal-driving-limit","tag-the-legal-limit","tag-the-miraculous-improvised-rescue","tag-the-moment","tag-the-mother","tag-the-neighbours","tag-the-other","tag-the-railing","tag-the-rescue","tag-the-time","tag-their-quick-response","tag-three-men","tag-time","tag-toddler"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/poland\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/20874","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/poland\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/poland\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/poland\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/poland\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=20874"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/poland\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/20874\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/poland\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/20875"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/poland\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=20874"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/poland\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=20874"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/poland\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=20874"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}