A 10-year old girl who saved her baby brother from a swimming pool and a young Co Cork man who saved four friends from the Atlantic were among 14 water-rescuers honoured at a ceremony in Dublin yesterday.
The Irish Water Safety awards also saw the time and efforts of 84 IWS volunteers acknowledged, while six international awards were given to people from in-shore rescue organisations.
Dublin girl Amy O’Donoghue rescued her brother Lee (4) from the bottom of a pool at the villa in the Canaries, last April.
Her mother, June, was putting sun screen on Amy and Lee. Having finished Lee she turned to Amy and suddenly noticed Lee had wandered away. “Amy ran out to the pool and when I got to the door I could see her hesitating and then jumping in.”
Amy said: “I just knew I had to get him off the bottom because he wouldn’t have been able to breathe. I can swim well because I was swimming since I was three.”
She handed him to her mum who performed artificial resuscitation on him.
Karl Dempsey, from Kinsale, was sailing with friends from Cork to Cape Clear two years ago when a hitch with the steering saw the boat “go full starboard” and they were catapulted into the water. “The boat was going slowly in a circle, trickling around us and I managed to intercept it and climb on board. I was able to steer the boat back towards the others and get them back on board.”
Among others honoured were four gardaí who rescued two people in incidents in September 2006 in Quayside, Waterford and in April this year in Co Clare.
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