A five-year-old boy who fell from a third-storey apartment balcony onto concrete yesterday afternoon has been released from hospital and is recovering at home with a cracked vertebrae.

Sgt. Drew Grainger, a spokesman for the Surrey RCMP, said the boy was playing with his two-year-old sibling in an apartment in the 10700-block of 139 Street in Whalley, when their mother decided to dash out and get something from a neighbour down the hall.

She was gone only a few minutes, he said, but when she got back to her apartment she had locked herself out.
Grainger said as their mother frantically tried to get back in the apartment for about an hour, her son went out on the balcony and climbed over the rail and fell to the concrete below.

The boy was airlifted to BC Children’s Hospital. He said the child sustained a back injury, and is believed to have a cracked vertebrae. He is expected to make a full recovery.

“It’s a miracle that he was not seriously injured,” said Grainger, adding that the incident has been deemed an accident by the RCMP.

“These accidents are always preventable,” he said, and cautioned parents against leaving the home with young children inside, even for a brief moment.

He said the incident also serves as a reminder to parents with young children and babies to be extra cautious about leaving windows and doors open, especially in the summer months.

“The reality is that it is that time of year when we all have our windows open. Every summer there are reports of children falling from windows.” said Grainger.

Last month, a Maple Ridge toddler died after plunging two storeys from a home in the 12400-block of 201 Street. The two-year-old boy was airlifted to hospital in what was believed to be non-life threatening condition, but later succumbed to his injuries.

Another Surrey toddler who fell from a window survived in a similar incident in May. In that case, a three-year-old girl survived a fall from a second-floor window at her house in the 14000-block of Surrey. The girl was bouncing on a sofa in a second-story room when she went through the screen and fell to a concrete and garden area below.
She was taken to Royal Columbian Hospital and was later released after undergoing some tests.