Vanessa Machiskinic speaks to the media Wednesday while her boyfriend, Adrian Key, holds their son, Jet. (CBC) When smoke started to spread on the second storey of an Edmonton apartment complex Wednesday, a couple dropped their 20-month-old baby safely into the arms of a neighbour on the ground.

"It was actually a pretty easy decision," said the mother, Vanessa Machiskinic. "I wasn't about to take him into a smoky, dark hallway."

Fire broke out just before 8:30 a.m. in the walkup that has a basement level and two above-ground floors located at 156th St. and 104th Avenue.

When alarms went off in the building, Machiskinic opened the door of her unit and found thick smoke in the hallway. She went back into her suite, grabbed a kitchen chair and smashed the balcony window. Her boyfriend, Adrian Key, then dropped their son, Jet, into the arms of a neighbour who was waiting below

"It was a really good decision on their part," said Dan Marianchuk, who caught the child. "They could have fell through a floor. There could have been a fire outside the door. So they didn't want to take chances with their baby."

Dan Marianchuk stands outside the apartment building where he caught a baby dropped from a balcony on Wednesday. (CBC)Marianchuk had been in his own unit in the building when the fire started. He ran outside and noticed a couple on the ground floor smashing their frozen balcony window to get out. They passed their son off the balcony to Marianchuk. Then he saw Mashiskinic and her boyfriend smash their balcony window one floor up.

"He then told me he wanted to drop his baby down … I reassured him that I would for sure catch the baby, because he seemed a little reluctant to drop him," Marianchuk said.

Key, Machiskinic and her sister all managed to get out safely.

When Machiskinic got outside, she thanked the man who caught her baby son, who was not injured.

"I felt like crying," she said. "He's our neighbour. I know he has two little boys too."

Machiskinic, her boyfriend and their son took refuge from the cold on an Edmonton transit bus that was brought in to keep apartment residents warm.

About 20 to 30 people were forced out of their homes by the fire, Edmonton Fire Rescue spokesperson Tim Wilson said.

"We contacted Red Cross and they'll be supporting residents for the next few days," he said. "They'll not be able to return to the building today because the utilities have been knocked out by the fire."

Fire investigators determined the source of the fire was a space heater in one of the suites. Damage has been estimated at about $500,000.