Life saved

(C) Greenpeace

At about 02:00 last night (Sunday morning), Phil was sitting on deck watching them unload the cargo/passenger ship next to us, and the passengers on the dock. Some of them were sleeping, but most of them were just standing around. Suddenly, they gathered at the edge of the dock.

Apparently, the three-year old boy was sound asleep next to his grandmother when he rolled over and off the dock. Tojo, a sailor from the Boken EP, jumped in to save him, but by the time he got the child back on the dock the boy showed no signs of life. Witnesses say that Tojo then picked the kid up by the legs (to get the water out), and carried him down the dock.

"This guy carrying a small child emerged from the crowd. I saw him hang the apparently lifeless child by the ankles over his back," Phil recalls. "Then I realized it was a drowning, and went running down our gangway yelling: 'CPR, CPR!'"

The rescuer let Phil put the child on the ground, and check the boy's breathing. There wasn't any so Phil began first aid.

"I was freaking out because I don't ever want to see, or hold in my arms, a dead child," says Phil. "After rescue breathing and only a few chest compressions, the child made what might be described as a cough, and a lot of mucus came from his sinuses. But he was still having trouble breathing, so I used my mouth to suck the snot and fluid out of his nose".

Meanwhile the guard at the end of the dock had noticed the commotion. "I was filling out a report when I heard someone shouting," said William the security guard. "When I got there I saw he was already applying CPR so I ran back to call an ambulance and the police."

The police responded quickly - within three minutes, according to the security guard. They got the boy in the back seat of their truck with Phil holding him. "On the way to the hospital he threw up a huge amount of sea water, which I took to be a good sign," says Phil.

At the hospital, after Phil had turned the boy over to the doctors, a man approached him. "He introduced himself as the boy's father, he thanked me and shook my hand". Today the police called the hospital for us. The boy is doing fine.

Phil is smiling a lot, but doesn't want to make a big deal out of the whole thing. William, when asked, said, "We've never had any accidents here before. But, yes, it feels good to have helped." As for Tojo, he works the night shift, and hasn't been back since, so we never even got to meet the man.