Kansas mum smashes car window to rescue trapped toddler

Sarah Oropeza used a tyre iron to break into a car and free a two-year-old girl who had been left there in near-100F heat

Ms Oropeza used a tyre iron to break the window of a car to free a trapped toddler (Facebook/KaRamel KRissty)

A woman in Kansas smashed a car window to rescue a two-year-old girl locked inside the vehicle in sweltering, near 100-degree heat.

Sarah Oropeza told US news channel KCTV5 how she raced to break the window with a tyre iron.

"I just kept thinking if I don't open this window, this baby is going to die," she told the channel.

The channel reported the weather outside that day "felt like 101 degrees" Fahrenheit (38 Celsius).

Ms Oropeza, who manages the Famous Footwear store in Merriam, had reportedly been in the middle of a sale to a customer when a co-worker came into the store and said she had see the girl trapped in a car in the car park outside.

Ms Oropeza, a mother of two, has been heralded as a hero for rescuing the child (Facebook/Sarah Oropeza)

She rushed to help but was unable to break the window, a woman ran over with a screwdriver but also failed to break the window.

Ms Oropeza was then given a tyre iron which cracked the window, and another woman, identified by Ms Oropeza as dental assistant Diana Piseno, broke the glass with a truck hitch.

A nurse attended the child, who was drenched in sweat having been stuck in the car but was otherwise unharmed.

Ms Oropeza, a mother of two, has been heralded as a hero for rescuing the child.

On her Facebook page she wrote "Thank you again everyone for your kind words. I was just doing the right thing."