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A FIVE-year-old girl and her three-year-old brother are fighting for their lives after they tumbled out of an apartment window and fell three storeys.
It is understood the pair had been jumping on a bed next to an open window — with a flyscreen their only protection.
The fall from the Bankstown unit was about 10m.
Neighbours told The Daily Telegraph the siblings had been playing on a bunk bed before the accident. Their family had moved to Australia from Jordan less than a month ago.
“It was a hot day, many people had their windows open,” one neighbour said.
A young man living on the first floor heard the commotion and ran downstairs to help.
Emergency services were called to South Terrace about 8.50am. The siblings were rushed to The Children’s Hospital at Westmead. The girl has life threatening injuries, while her brother is in a stable condition.
A child safety expert said parents should be wary about placing furniture close to windows.
“Beds become trampolines, cupboards become vantage points,” Kidsafe NSW executive officer Christine Erskine said.
“It’s best that children are restricted from bouncing and climbing near windows.” Ms Erskine said fly screens would not prevent children falling out.
“As a result of these types of accidents, we now know that they don’t act as a barrier against children,” she said. “In order to have a barrier, what we recommend is that either the windows remain locked or that there is a restrictor on the window so it can only open to about 12.5cm.”
Ms Erskine said new strata building laws were changing and, by March next year, all windows in NSW would be required to have locks and restrictors.
“There are 50 children a year across Australia that fall out of windows,” she said.
“We’re also living in a more dense community that (has) more and more high rises. We need to be ahead of our game.”
Police were last night still investigating the incident.