A Chinese toddler playing hide-and-seek escaped unhurt after falling from a fifth-floor balcony when he was caught in a bed quilt held up by quick-thinking residents on the street below, mainland media reports.
Dramatic video footage, which has been widely shared on mainland social media, captured the moment when the boy named Xiaojing, aged one and a half, fell from the apartment balcony on Tuesday and was caught in the quilt in the city of Dongguan in the southern province of Guangdong, Dongguan Television Station reported on Wednesday.
Xiaojing was spotted out on the balcony alone by his grandmother’s neighbours, after he locked his grandmother out of the room at her home where they were playing hide-and-seek together.
Police were called and asked neighbours to hold out four quilts on the street below the balcony to catch him in case he fell.
Xiaojing escaped without injury after falling onto one of the quilts, just as police had arrived at the building to try to reach him on the balcony.
The grandma, identified by her surname, Mao, told the television station that Xiaojing was a good-natured boy and had locked the door as they were playing hide-and-seek.
Concerned about the boy, she began to knock on the door and asked him to open it, but he became upset after he was unable to unlock the door.
She said he then went out onto the balcony and tried to get out of the room by climbing over the balcony’s railing, which had led to the incident.
The boy was later examined by a doctor, who reported that Xiaojing was unharmed despite his fall from the fifth-floor apartment’s balcony.