Moment mother saves her four children by throwing them from the third floor of a burning building in Turkey
- A video of the incident has been shared online showing the children being saved
- The mother drops her children out of a window as smoke billows out behind her
- People in the street below hold blankets out to save the children from the fall
- Local media said all children and the mother have recovered and are doing fine
A woman rescued her four children from a burning building in Istanbul by throwing them out of a window on Wednesday.
A video of the incident in the city’s European Esenler district showed the mother dropping her children from a third-floor window as black smoke billowed from the fire behind her.
All of the children and the mother are doing fine, Turkish media reported.
The footage, captured from someone watching from the street below, shows each child falling from the third floor of a five-floor building.
Pictured: A mother drops her child from a third story window of a burning building, and is seen moments before being caught by people on the streets below
The mother can be seen holding her children out of the window, waiting for the people below to be ready for the catch, before letting them drop.
They are shown falling, past the window of a bridal shop, and narrowly avoiding the awning of a shop below, as volunteers stretch out a blanket to catch them.
Bystanders were heard screaming amid sounds of alarms, with some shouting at the woman not to drop the children.
After being caught by the people below, the children were carried to ambulances, and Turkish media reported they were uninjured.
The mother was hospitalised as a precaution and then discharged, according to news reports.
The fire, which began in an electrical panel, was extinguished. Two other children and two older adults were also rescued.
In this image taken from video provided by IHA, one of four children is dropped from an apartment window to bystanders below after a fire broke out, Thursday, Feb. 25, 2021, in Istanbul, Turkey
One of the neighbors who witnessed the rare rescue said, ‘First, black smoke started to come out,’ according to Daily Sabah, a Turkish newspaper.
‘Then, the children started shouting from the windows. And we opened the blankets. A woman threw the children down from above. So, we caught four kids with blankets.’
The fire was later extinguished by firefighters, the newspaper reported.