Teen hailed a hero after Malua rescue
Published: April 20, 2007
A TEENAGE body boarder has been hailed as a hero after he saved the life of a tourist last weekend.
Choosing to nick out for a surf on a sunny Sunday afternoon instead of cleaning his room could hardly have been a better choice for 16-year-old Chris Leach, or for the 44-year-old Asian woman whom he saved.
Chris had seen a woman shouting from the Malua Bay shoreline at about 3pm and saw another woman struggling in the water, among rocks, at the northern end of the beach.
As he looked, she went down, emerging three times, then disappearing.
Chris said that as he reached the location, he dived in and pulled the barely-conscious woman to the surface.
“I asked if she was all right and she pulled me off the board. I tried to stand her up but she just collapsed so I swam her in and carried her and that’s when the lifeguards came over,” he said.
“If I hadn’t got there, she would have died for sure.”
Batemans Bay Life Saving spokesman Tony Vella said the lifeguards had administered CPR and oxygen. There had been some initial confusion that led to the belief someone else was still in the water, prompting another rescue mission.
An ambulance spokesman said the woman recovered consciousness on arrival at the hospital and was discharged within hours.
As in all 30 other rescues at the beach this year - and the 120 rescues by paid lifeguards across the Eurobodalla over summer - the victim had been swimming outside the flags.
“If you’re not between the flags we can’t see you. The surfers were up the northern end of the beach; I’d like to thank them for doing what they did,” Mr Vella said.
“Most people have been excellent in working with the lifeguards. Most of the rescues were foreigners; we need some PR (information broadcasts) on planes because they’re getting off, coming to the beach and getting into trouble.”
Chris, a former Nipper who has a Bronze Medallion, said becoming a hero was not the golden experience he thought it would be.
“She spewed up on my back three times; she’d swallowed heaps of water. She was floating on the water (facing down); she looked like she was dead.”
Chris echoed Mr Vella’s advice.
“Swim between the flags, especially if you’re a tourist,” he said.
Mum was understandably proud, and the bedroom got its allotted clean once the excitement died down.
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