I THOUGHT HE WAS GONE
BEACH DRAMA: Man fights for life after locals pull four swimmers from rip in Torquay rescue
A MAN was last night clinging to life after he and three friends were pulled from a rip at a Torquay beach by hero bystanders.
One of the rescuers, Tom Wiles, said he was most concerned about the last man they got to. “I just kept thinking, ‘he is gone’,” Mr Wiles said.
“They were just flailing. It makes you realise how easy it is (to drown), how tired you get. They couldn’t move.”
RESCUER TOM WILES
A MAN is clinging to life after he and three other people were pulled from a rip at a Torquay beach by hero bystanders.
Three men and a woman were swimming clothed at the unguarded Whites Beach in Torquay yesterday when they became caught in the rip and started to drown.
Former swimming pool lifeguard Tom Wiles, 30, was walking along the clifftop with his partner when he noticed the group trying to swim in rough conditions.
“We were walking past and I said to my partner, ‘That’s how people drown’,” Mr Wiles said.
He said the four people, who were initially up to their waists in water, were dragged out and lost their footing, causing their heads to go underwater in the rough and choppy conditions.
“Then it was like something out of Bondi Rescue — we were lucky there was a surfer very close,” Mr Wiles said.
“They were just flailing. It makes you realise how easy it is (to drown), how tired you get. They couldn’t move.”
As Mr Wiles ran for the water, Che McCallum and James Kernot, who were surfing together, also went to help the swimmers.
“The surfers and I just started dragging them in — the one we got to last was the one I was most concerned about,” Mr Wiles said. That man, aged in his 20s, was found face down, not breathing and remained in a critical condition in hospital last night.
“I just kept thinking, ‘He is gone’,” Mr Wiles said.
Using his lifeguard training, Mr Wiles began CPR on the patient while his partner called for medical help. Eventually the man started breathing and specialist paramedics were able to take over and give the man the treatment he required.
While Mr Wiles, a Torquay local, has practised CPR, it was the first time he had needed to use it. He now believes every person should learn how to do resuscitation.
“Everybody should know it. It also shows how crucial water education is,” Mr Wiles said.
“It was so rough and choppy it was lucky that there were any surfers there.”
Ambulance Victoria spokesman John Mullen said MICA paramedics, an incident controller, road units and an air ambulance were called to the scene and gave emergency treatment to the patients.
The patients — all aged in their 20s — were taken to Geelong hospital by road ambulance just after 4pm.
At that stage, one patient was in a critical condition and the three other patients were in a serious condition.
Late last night the most seriously injured man remained in a critical condition, another man remained in a serious condition, while the conditions of the third man and the woman were downgraded to stable, hospital spokesman Jono Pech said.
Surfer Mr McCallum was shaken after helping rescue swimmers from the water and doing CPR.
“I just hope they’ll be all right. They were lucky there were a few of us there,” he said.