IT’S GOT YOUR SON!
When Jennifer Buhl, 50, left her son playing in a kids’ club on holiday, she had no idea of the horror that lay in wait for him...
Splashing around in the pool with my boys, Charlie, 12, and Johnny, six, I grinned. We were at Club Med, an all-inclusive resort in Cancún, Mexico.
It was our second trip – we’d all loved it so much the first time, we’d come back to celebrate my 50th birthday.
With swimming, snorkelling, dancing and yummy food, it was the perfect vacation.
The boys’ favourite part was the kids’ club – it was lovely to see them making friends and having fun, while I made my own pals to chat to at the bar.
Climbing out of the pool, I grabbed a towel and turned to Charlie and Johnny.
‘Shall we shower before dinner?’ I said.
‘Can I go to kids’ club?’ Charlie asked.
‘Sure, that’s fine,’ I smiled. ‘We’ll meet you at the evening performance later.’
Giving him a quick kiss goodbye, he ran off to join his friends while Johnny and I got ready in our room.
At the restaurant, we met up with a friend I’d made at the pool that afternoon, Maria, and Johnny scarfed down his dinner in five minutes before running off to kids’ club, too.
As we finished up our drinks, my thoughts turned to dessert.
Going up to the chocolate fondue fountain, I piled my plate with fresh strawberries, drizzled in melted chocolate, and sat back down.
I was just about to tuck in when I noticed a boy and his dad running over to our table. I recognised them from Charlie’s kids’ club.
‘Jennifer, you need to come,’ the man said urgently, catching his breath. ‘Your son has just been attacked by a crocodile.’
My spoon clattered to the floor and I felt the blood drain from my face.
I scraped my chair back from the table, running as fast as I could out of the restaurant and shoving past anyone who was in my path.
I was terrified – my body was manic, but my mind was posing terrible scenarios.
Who is it, Charlie or Johnny? Will he be dead? What if the crocodile dragged him away?
Another guest pointed me in the right direction, and as I ran I saw a huddle of people around the pool deck surrounding Charlie.
As I reached him, I flung myself onto him and hugged him tight. Glancing down at his leg, I felt sick.
Skin and tissue were hanging off his calf, and blood was streaming all around him.
‘Mama, it hurts,’ he cried. ‘It hurts so bad.’
‘I know,’ I said, holding him close and trying to soothe him.
I had no idea if it would OK. But he was alive and breathing though – I clung onto that.
‘Please, God,’ I prayed out loud. ‘Please let my boy be OK.’
Thankfully, one of the guests was a nurse, and another was a doctor – between them they were pressing down on the gushing artery in Charlie’s leg, desperately trying to stop him from losing more blood.
Guests told me that an ambulance was on its way, and someone ran to get Johnny – we were a family, and I needed him to be with us.
‘I miss you, I miss you,’ he sobbed to Charlie. ‘Are you going to die?’
It was heart-breaking. Finally, after 30 minutes, which felt like forever, paramedics arrived.
We were taken to Amerimed Hospital, Cancún, and doctors took Charlie to the shock room. ‘You’ll need to wait here,’ a nurse said as I tried to follow.
People were rushing around, and I could hear Charlie’s screams as Johnny and I sat huddled on the floor.
It was torture. Eventually a doctor came outside to tell me what was going on.
‘His leg has been crushed, he’ll probably
My spoon clattered and I felt the blood drain from my face
lose his limb,’ she said, in broken English.
I was devastated, but I just wanted Charlie to live.
As long as he’s alive, we can deal with it, I thought. ‘Just save his life,’ I begged. It wasn’t until the early hours of the morning that Charlie was taken to surgery.
As we waited, Club Med staff arrived at the hospital with my bag. I’d left it behind in my rush to go with Charlie.
They were the ones who’d pulled Charlie from the croc’s vicious grip, and they told me what had happened.
‘They were playing hide and seek with kids’ club,’ one said.
Charlie and his friend Cyrus, 13, had hidden on the stairs of the pool deck, that led down to the lagoon.
‘The croc jumped several feet out of the water and grabbed Charlie’s leg,’ he continued.
He told me how the 13-foot crocodile had bitten down on my boy’s leg and dragged him under the water.
I felt sick.
He was in kids’ club. He should have been safe.
I knew crocodiles lived in the lagoon that stretched across Cancún’s hotel zone, but I never dreamed they’d be a risk, as I presumed Club Med had taken safety precautions.
I’d even told my boys not to swim in the lagoon at night, but I just thought that was me being overly cautious
Cyrus thought Charlie had fallen in at first, but when he tried to grab his arm, he realised something was pulling him back.
A group of guests heard the boy’s terrified screams and ran down to help, too.
‘We punched it with our feet and fists and poked its eyes until it let go,’ they said as I listened in horror.
They had been able to pull Charlie out of immediate danger and tie a torniquet around his leg in an attempt to stop him bleeding out, before finding me.
The thought of what might have happened to Charlie if Cyrus and the other guests hadn’t been there made my blood run cold.
The crocodile had spent the rest of the evening prowling around the lagoon at the bottom of the stairs.
After a tense four-hour wait for Charlie to come out of surgery, I spoke to his doctor.
‘I’m happy with how the operation has gone,’ his surgeon said. ‘But there is still a lot to be concerned about.’
Miraculously, it looked like he wouldn’t lose his leg.
They showed me Charlie’s leg all stapled up.
My boy looks like a puzzle piece, I thought sadly.
Charlie had to stay in hospital for four weeks – my family came to help out with Johnny and support us.
He had surgery every three days, to clean the wound.
It was so exhausting for him, but the crocodile had bitten into his bone, so the doctors wanted to make sure he didn’t get any infections.
But finally in July 2021, five weeks after we’d arrived for our week-long stay at Club Med, we flew home to Philadelphia, Pennsylvania.
It took three months for the wound to close up and Charlie still has massive scars.
For a while he had to walk on crutches, and we had to clean and wrap his wound every day.
Gradually though, his staples began to be removed.
Now Charlie is on his way to being able to walk and run like a normal kid, but he does have a little limp and doesn’t like anyone touching his leg.
He struggles to play soccer, as he gets shooting pains from nerve damage when he runs, and he can’t be tackled due to pain and sensitivity.
The skin is very thin on his calf, and he gets fatigued easily.
He’s doing well, but it could take him years to recover fully – and even then, his leg will never be the same again.
But he still has his leg and his life. It’s a miracle, really.
What’s terrifying though is that Charlie was just one of four crocodile attacks in Cancún that month.
Since it happened, Club Med have taken more precautions around the lagoon to stop this happening again.
They have invested $200,000 to secure the area with guards and signage, and water skiing has been permanently suspended at the resort.
But it was too little, too late for Charlie, and I worry there is still imminent danger around the area in other resorts.
Even now I worry about how Charlie is dealing with it all – he’s a boy of few words, but I know it has affected him.
It’s been traumatic and hard for Charlie, Johnny, now seven, and me to get over –it’s not the end to our trip we expected, and we won’t be going back to Cancún any time soon.
But the boys are in therapy, and they’re both doing well.
I’m just so glad Charlie is still with us and in one piece.
My son is a miracle.