Mother throws child out window, jumps to safety from fire

FAYETTEVILLE, Ga. — Firefighters are still working to learn what caused an apartment building to go up in flames early Thursday afternoon.

News Chopper 2 flew over the Weatherly Walk Apartments in Fayetteville just before 2 p.m. Thursday, where firefighters could be seen dousing the apartment building with water, trying to get the flames under control.

Several people were home when the fire broke out.

Kathleen Rojas told Channel 2's Richard Elliot that she and her 4-year-old daughter, Brianna, found themselves trapped on the second floor by the flames and yelled for help.

They found several people there to save them.

"I couldn't open the door because there was so much smoke. So I ran to the kids' bedroom, to the far room, and I saw Amanda and them coming," Rojas told Elliot.

Amanda is the property manager of the apartment complex.

She had seen the flames, grabbed her maintenance man, Chuck Faison, and ran to try and get people out of the building.

Rojas called to them for help from her second story window.

"They told me just to drop the baby, and they turned off the gas, and they said, 'Just drop the baby,' so I dropped her and they said, 'OK, come on,' and they caught me," Rojas said.

Faison said he was the one who begged Rojas to drop Brianna and then jump herself.

Everyone at the apartment complex is now calling him a hero.

"At the time, I really didn't think. I was just thinking, you know, help the people, and that was it. That's all that clicked, but if they want to call me a hero, then a hero I am," Faison said.

Fire investigators said 10 families were displaced by Thursday's fire.

WSBTV