The man is seen clambering up the building, floor by floor, using only his bare hands to get a grip in social media footage.
This is the hair-raising moment a heroic man climbs four floors to save a young child dangling from a balcony as astonished crowds watch on.

The man, likened to web-slinging superhero Spiderman after the incident, sprang into action after the four-year-old boy was seen desperately clinging to a balcony in Paris on Saturday afternoon.

Fire crews had already been called to the building at Rue Marx-Dormoy in the French capital's 18th arrondissement with a terrified neighbour on the neighbouring balcony struggling to help the boy back up.

And one brave man started climbing before emergency services arrived, with jaw-dropping social media footage showing him risking his life.

The man is seen clambering up the building, floor by floor, using only his bare hands to get a grip.
As he progresses towards the distressed child, he is urged on by a crowd of onlookers who had gathered below to catch the boy, should he fall.

The hero appears to mount each level of the building with ease before reaching the boy.

He then grabs the child by his hand and whisks him to the safety of the balcony to cries and applause from the watching crowd.
One witness, a 17-year-old student called Samy, told local website Le Parisien : "All of a sudden, there's this guy who climbed every floor.

"He took the child and put him back in his balcony. Everything happened so fast.

"He did not think, he went straight up. People were screaming, they were shocked.
"When we saw that he had finally managed to climb up there, everyone shouted in relief."

Both the hero and the boy were looked after by firefighters.
The child escaped with just a torn nail, while the man suffered scratches from his climb.
Local media reported the boy's father later told authorities he had been out shopping at the time of the incident but the door to the balcony was shut.

An investigation into the incident is now underway.