#trending: 'Barehanded baby catching hero' saves toddler falling from 6th storey apartment in China

TONGXIANG (CHINA) — A man’s acute “dad instincts” saved a two-year-old girl falling from an apartment block in eastern China.

Footage of the heart-stopping rescue in Tongxiang city of Zhejiang province last Tuesday (July 19) was shared on Twitter by China's foreign ministry spokesperson Zhao Lijian. 

The official lauded the man as a “hero among us” in his viral post that has received 205,200 views and 11,100 likes as of Wednesday.

In the video, a man is seen rushing towards the building with a woman while on the phone. Seconds later, he flings his phone aside to catch the falling toddler with his arms.

Media reports indicated that the toddler fell from the sixth storey of the apartment block and landed on a first-storey terrace made of steel, which somewhat cushioned her fall. She then tumbled off the terrace before being caught by the man named Shen Dong, 31.

Mr Shen, who works in a nearby bank, was parking his car across the street when he heard a loud thump coming from the apartment complex, Chinese media outlet Kan Kan News reported. 

He realised that the thump was a child only when the toddler started moving.

The father-of-two immediately dashed across the road while calling for the local rescue team. His female colleague also rushed forward and called out to the toddler on the roof to stop moving.

However, the child slid off the roof, prompting Mr Shen to throw his phone aside and reach to catch the child, mere seconds before she would have hit the concrete pavement.

The child was taken to a nearby hospital by Mr Shen along with her mother. She suffered leg injuries that required stitches and minor lung injuries but was otherwise in stable condition.

Media reports said that the toddler had apparently climbed on a stool before falling out of the sixth-storey window of the building.

Mr Shen told Chinese media: “I regularly exercise, so my arms were not hurt. I believe that anyone could have come forward to catch the girl. I was just there at the right time.

“The girl is called Xinxin. Coincidentally, my daughter is also called Xinxin. Even the characters are the same.”

Chinese media have dubbed Mr Shen as the “barehanded baby catching hero” for his quick reflexes that saved the toddler.

The online community was brimming with praise for him. “The hero should be given a medal. And a new phone,” one said in a YouTube video posted by the Hong Kong's news media South China Morning Post. 

“I've seen people breaking their bones catching someone. He deserves to be called a hero,” another commented.

However, some others were not convinced that the video was genuine, questioning if Mr Shen could have caught the child so easily if it were.