A quick-thinking soldier recently dived into alligator-infested water and pulled a woman from a submerged vehicle at a Fort Stewart Georgia, pond.
Pfc. Nathan Currie, from the 756th Explosive Ordnance Disposal Company, heard a sedan crash into Fort Stewart’s Holbrook Pond, the U.S. Army reported Tuesday. He dropped his fishing gear, drove to the other side of the pond and dived in when he saw that only the driver’s side tires were above the water.
“My Army training helped by preparing me to respond quickly and take action with courage and confidence under adverse conditions,” Pfc. Currie said, the Army reported.
The first time the solider entered the water, he felt a woman inside the vehicle but had to come up for air. He then dived down a second time and was able to bring her to the surface and revive her with cardiopulmonary resuscitation. The woman had been underwater for five minutes and had turned blue.
“He is part of a team that lives each moment of every day in service to others, a team of soldiers that continually prepare themselves through tough realistic training and then they execute with little or no thought regarding their own safety,” said Command Sgt. Maj. Harold E. Dunn IV, 20th CBRNE Command’s senior enlisted adviser, the Army reported. “They drive themselves each day just a little further knowing they will, not could, be called to the front to clear the path for others to travel.”
A second soldier, Command Sgt. Maj. Wylie Hutchison, the senior enlisted leader for the Fort Stewart-based 188th Infantry Brigade, also arrived at the scene and dived into the water to make sure no one else was left in the vehicle while Pfc. Currie performed CPR.
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• Douglas Ernst can be reached at dernst@washingtontimes.com.
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