Strangers help rescue boy, 11, from Taylor River waterfall

Rod and Lisa Huneault are hopeful they will find the strangers who rescued their son from drowning in the Taylor River, pulling him from the brink of a waterfall and administering CPR.

The drama played out Aug. 19 as Rod, his friend, and his 11-yearold son, Lucas, were heading home from a camping trip in Ucluelet. The group stopped at a popular swimming hole on the river west of Port Alberni.

Lucas, a strong swimmer, went around a bend in the river and his dad lost sight of him.

“What he likes to do is be a fish, basically,” Rod Huneault said from the family home in Nanaimo. “He’ll open his eyes underwater and explore along the edge. I guess he forgot where he was, because he had been warned.”

A man he knows only as a respiratory therapist noticed Lucas in the current heading toward the waterfall.

The man initially thought the boy was in control, but soon realized he was stuck, Huneault said. “So he jumped down and reached through the water and grabbed his arm.”

Seconds later, Huneault arrived and jumped in.

The boy was unconscious when they retrieved him, and Huneault estimated he was underwater for up to four minutes.

Lucas was airlifted to B.C. Children’s Hospital. and is now doing well at home.