A father and his 12-year-old son gained heroic fame after authorities praised them for rescuing a four-year-old boy from death. Authorities in Lawrence, Kansas, said the little boy with autism briefly disappeared from his mother’s eyes and made his way through a locked fence to the pool in the yard, just before he jumped inside.
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“His head was completely submerged. He could not call for help,” said Jeff Carl, a paramedic who lost his son in 2008. He explained at a post-incident press conference: “You can see his hands moving over the water, trying to climb outside”.
Maddox Westerhouse, 12, noticed something moving inside the pool and ran to call his father, Tom, from their nearby apartment. As the father and son got a little closer, they immediately realized that what was seen in the water was actually a drowning child and in a moment would lose his life. Tom jumped over the fence at a height of almost two meters, pulled the four-year-old out of the pool and began performing resuscitation operations on him.
“When he started coughing and vomiting the water, I realized he was fine, that I was not late. I can say I was missing a beat, especially since I also have a son of my own and such a frightening case because it is someone’s child,” the protagonist recalled. The boy’s mother, Alexis, met Tom and Maddox for the first time last Thursday, thanking them for rescuing her son. “I do not know what I would have done to myself if these two had not been there at that moment,” the mother said feeling guilty.
According to the American Red Cross, about 10 people die every day from accidental drowning, and on average, two of them under the age of 14. The American Center for Disease Control and Prevention encourages citizens to learn to swim, and if there are children in the area, install several barriers around the pools. Similar in the future.