MIRACLE GIRL ON MEND AFTER FALL
The death-defying 9-yearold girl who survived a plunge from her sixth-floor Harlem apartment fell while grabbing a teetering air conditioner, her mom said Tuesday.
Distraught mother Iesha Punter was relieved and teary-eyed holding a vigil for her critically injured daughter at Harlem Hospital Tuesday morning.
“By the grace of God, she’ll pull through,” Punter told the Daily News. “It’s not just a broken leg. It’s more than that. I’m trying to stay strong. It’s overwhelming. I’ve been crying since 5 o’clock yesterday.”
According to Punter, her daughter was trying to pull the unsteady AC unit back into the apartment — and instead, both wound up going out the window.
The 9-year-old, her plunge broken by an awning, landed on the secondstory roof of an adjoining day care center in the St. Nicholas Houses on W. 129th St. near Frederick Douglass Blvd.
Grandmother Emily Punter said the girl’s mom briefly came home from the hospital to share the positive prognosis for the fortunate child.
“She’s OK, she’s OK,” said the weepy Punter, 65, who refused to even think about the worst-case scenario of the Monday evening fall.
“Oh my God, I don’t even want to go there,” said Punter, baby-sitting her two other grandkids while Iesha stayed by her daughter’s bed. “She’s my favorite. But I guess things happen.”
The falling child landed directly alongside the crumpled air conditioner, which sent a massive boom echoing down the block when it hit the roof of the Utopia Children’s Center.
Incredibly, she was alert, conscious and able to speak with first responders on the ambulance ride to the hospital.
Cops said the little girl was alone in the apartment while the mother picked up her two sons from the nearby Promise Academy.
“She takes good care of her kids,” said Emily Punter.