Mother climbs down side of building to rescue children from burning home in South Korea

A woman in South Korea attempted a dangerous rescue by climbing down the side of a building after a fire in her fifth-floor apartment on Monday evening trapped her three young children inside.

The Gwangyang city’s fire department said they received a report at 5.23pm local time of a blaze that had broken out in the living room of the apartment in South Jeolla province. Three children under the age of five were inside.

Their mother, reported to be in her 40s, was unable to reach the children through the apartment’s entrance because of heavy smoke and flames, so she went up to the sixth floor and climbed down the outside wall through a balcony window to reach her unit, The Korea Herald reported.

After getting inside, she stayed with the children and shielded them until firefighters arrived and rescued them using a ladder truck, the report said.

Fire authorities said they deployed 10 vehicles and 30 personnel to put out the blaze and rescue the mother and her three daughters.

A photograph released by the Gwangyang fire station showed the apartment building where the rescue took place.

The fire was eventually extinguished shortly before 6.30pm. The woman and her children were taken to a local hospital with complaints of minor smoke inhalation and later discharged.

“A parent’s concern for their children must have outweighed everything else in that urgent moment,” a firefighter was quoted as saying by The Korea JoongAng Daily.

“Still, climbing between balconies is extremely dangerous, and it was a stroke of luck that it didn’t lead to a secondary accident.”

The family reportedly lost their home in the fire.

Gwangyang city officials are believed to be reviewing support measures for the mother and her daughters.

The cause of the fire is being investigated.