A 4-year-old girl rescued after the porch she was playing on collapsed on her says she’s “going to be fine.”
Kayla Martin was released from the hospital Tuesday after the roof of a porch at her home in Chicago’s South Shore neighborhood collapsed while she was playing with her neighbor.
“She blocked her face, she tucked under, that’s what saved her,” said her mother Natasha Bell.
“Papa showed me how to do that,” Kayla said.
When Bell realized what had happened, she feared the worst for her daughter.
“The first time I called her she didn’t respond,” Bell said. “But then she’s like, ‘Mommy, I’m right here.’”
Area residents rushed to the scene to begin digging Kayla out of the rubble.
Local
“I was talking to her the whole time, telling her ‘Don’t move, mommies coming,’” said Bell. “She did really good.”
Bell said Kayla had several cuts on her head following the collapse. She University of Chicago Comer Children’s Hospital in serious condition and was released Tuesday.
“I believe in God and angels. They were on her shoulders. She protected herself,” said Bell. “To the people pulling her out, I’m grateful, very grateful. I thank the whole neighborhood.”
The home has been deemed uninhabitable until the porch is fixed.
