Woman, Girl Rescued From Burning Building

Late to a sales appointment Thursday morning, Andrew Quihuiz decided to take a shortcut. The decision saved a little girl’s life.

The shortcut brought Quihuiz near an Eton Place duplex that was engulfed in flames, a 26-year-old woman and her 4-year-old daughter who were trapped inside.

“I saw a lady screaming that she had a baby inside and I said, ‘Throw her out!’ ” Quihuiz said.

She did. Quihuiz caught the girl, tossed by Christine Lyddon from a window 20 feet above.

“I caught her like a baseball,” he said. “I took her over to a truck and sat her there and she told me that she was worried about her toys burning. I told her that I would buy her new toys.”

The child, Christy, who fire officials said accidentally started the fire while playing with a cigarette lighter, suffered smoke inhalation but was otherwise not injured.

But the drama did not end there. Quihuiz was joined by 26-year-old Scott Belt, a neighbor who saw the smoke through his kitchen window. Belt, wearing a cast over a broken leg, persuaded a hysterical Lyddon to jump.

“There was no way out and it was engulfed in flames,” Belt said. “I coached her about five times and finally, she came out head-first, like a torpedo.”

Belt was able to break Lyddon’s fall, but she still landed head-first into the asphalt. She suffered numerous injuries, including a broken ankle and smoke inhalation, fire officials said.

Mother and daughter were taken to UC Irvine Medical Center in Orange.