Manager catches baby falling off counter in Utah pawnshop

HURRICANE, Utah -- Surveillance video from inside a southern Utah pawnshop shows the moment a store employee saves a young child from what could have been a dangerous fall.

Bill Reel, the store manager of Family Pawn in Hurricane, told KSTU-TV he's not a hero - simply a father of four with quick reflexes who knows how suddenly accidents can happen.

"You're just an ordinary person who happened to have the opportunity to do something good, and you did it," said Reel.

The video shows two women shopping for a gun on Saturday afternoon. They place a child on the glass counter, and that's when the situation took a turn for the worse.

Reel noticed the baby starting to fall and rushed into action.

"I just saw the baby look unsteady, and I just booked it that way," Reel said. "I just so happened to time it out just right and caught the baby just before it hit."

Reel said the baby was falling headfirst - a three-and-a-half foot drop onto concrete.

"I was scared to death, and I grabbed the baby. My heart was racing," Reel added. "I held the baby for a couple of seconds, and then I gave it back to I believe grandma. There's no doubt that baby was gonna get hurt, and I think there was even a risk of, you know, some brain injury."

Luckily, the baby was not injured.

Reel said the story is an example of the many things that can go wrong when you take an eye off your kids for just a second.

"It could've gone south. It could've gone bad, and it didn't," he said. "We got lucky, and I just think we all have to do a better job at being careful and watching our kids and other people's kids too."