WASHINGTON — A mother and a young girl are safe after firefighters rescued them from a burning apartment building Saturday morning.

At around 6:45 a.m., D.C. firefighters responded to reports of a fire at a three-story building in the the 3100 block of Sherman Avenue near Howard University.

When they arrived, they found smoke spewing from a second-story apartment and realized that a woman and little girl were trapped, according to Doug Buchanan, a  D.C. Fire spokesman.

“The woman and child were quickly helped down a ladder that the firefighters put up against that second floor apartment window, that faced right out on to Sherman Avenue and got them out just in time,” Buchanan said.

The woman and child were not injured, nor was anyone else inside the apartment complex when the fire began.

A fire fighter was taken to the hospital after suffering a minor shoulder injury.

The small fire was extinguished and according to Buchanan, contained to one apartment. The cause of the fire remains under investigation.

“In this case, it turned out everything went perfect and maybe in the end we may have saved a couple lives this morning,” Buchanan said.