14 DAY TRIAL // An Essex care worker turned into a hero after catching a baby boy dropped by his mom from the first-floor window of a burning house.
Bethan Woolford, 20, was driving to work when she heard a desperate mother's shouts for help coming from a burning building. She immediately stopped her car and noticed frightened Robyn Jeffrey at the top floor window crying for help to rescue her one-year-old son Harley from the house engulfed by flames and smoke.
Without any hesitation, Ms. Woolford told the 17-year-old mother to drop the child into her arms, promising she would catch him. And she did manage to catch the toddler safely, while a van driver also stopped and rescued Ms. Jeffrey, after placing a ladder against the wall of the burning home.
Well, I guess there is an angel for each of us, who just happens to be in the right place at the right time.
Woolford's quick thinking saved the little boy's life, who didn't seem to be scared, as he immediately started giggling.
“I caught him round his waist. It was just instinct, I didn’t really think about it. [...] Afterwards Harley was just laughing. He thought it was hilarious. I think he wanted another go,” the curageous rescuer said.
On the other hand, Ms. Jeffrey said dropping her son was “the most difficult decision of her life,” but she explained that in that terrifying moment she simply didn't have another option. The only escape from the ordeal was her bedroom window.
“I woke up to find thick black smoke everywhere. I couldn’t see anything because the smoke was so thick. I went to the window and I was just screaming ‘Help me, my baby is in here, ’” she explained, according to Daily Mail.
She also said she was very thankful to her baby’s rescuer, adding that, for her, Ms. Woolford was definitely a hero.
“I wouldn’t have jumped, I just don’t think I could have done it. It was the hardest day of my life but I’m so glad my little boy came to no harm,” the young mother stated.
The fire on Robyn’s house in Harlow, Essex, started on the morning of March 20 and ruined the property completely, leaving her and her family homeless.
Luckily, they have been able to find a new home.
The local fire brigade and police department have started an investigation to determine the cause of the blaze.