A heroic father suffered severe injuries while trying to save his son from plunging off a balcony in Australia. 

Brad Lewis, 42, was with his two sons at a friend’s home playing with a Nerf gun when things took a tragic turn, and both Lewis and his son ended up falling from a balcony onto the cement pavement below. 

“His son shot a few Nerf gun bullets at him,” a GoFundMe page started to help the family reads. “Brad's son, Oscar, ran out to the balcony to check where the bullets had gone, lost his balance and began to tumble over the railing.”

Lewis lunged to save his son and managed to grab him but both of them fell over the railing together, according to the GoFundMe page.

“During the fall, Brad recalls that he made sure he pinned Oscar to his chest and curled around him so that he could take the brunt of the impact — not Oscar,” the page states.

Lewis sustained head and neck injuries, cracked his skull open, and bruised his brain – among other injuries, according to the page.

“Doctors have expressed their astonishment that Brad is in fact still alive having sustained the injuries that he did,” the post read. “If not for Brad's heroic actions it is unlikely that his son, Oscar, would have been so lucky.”

The GoFundMe for the family has already raised more than $50,000 of its $150,000 goal. 

The family is expecting it to take six to 12 months for Brad to recover.

“While the family are still trying to come to terms with what happened, they are so incredibly grateful for the out pouring of support from their family, friends and the wider community — many of you they don't even know.”

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