July 29, 2024 is a day that won’t soon be forgotten for two families in Lethbridge and local emergency personnel, as a routine summer outing to the YMCA took a scary turn.
Long-time friends Benjamin Nunez and Carter Lam were swimming, an activity Carter’s mother Candice says they do together regularly, referring to the boys as “strong swimmers”. Carter challenged himself to swim the entire length of the pool underwater in one breath. He made it about three-quarters of the way across before blacking out and sinking to the bottom. Benjamin was following his friend along the pool deck, when he quickly realized that something was not right.
“I saw some bubbles come up and then I started to go to the other side, wondering what happened,” Benjamin says. “For a second, I thought he was joking, but then I jumped in and tried to tell somebody to help. Then they blew a whistle and started to do CPR.”
The 10-year-old says, “It was scary. I just felt scared”, but “I couldn’t just leave him there”. He jumped into the pool and started pulling nine-year-old Carter to the edge of the pool.
That quick-thinking set off a chain of life-saving events. Lifeguards pulled Carter out of the pool. The boy was unconscious, was not breathing and did not have a pulse. Coincidentally, a local physician, Dr. Ryan Derman, and off-duty paramedic firefighter Nicholas Spencer were at the facility and were able to rush in and help.
Working alongside lifeguards, Dr. Derman started administering CPR with the help of Spencer. The two took turns performing chest compressions and rescue breaths and after several minutes, Carter was breathing again.
GRATEFUL
Carter’s mother, Candice Lam, says she was at home when she received the call that an incident had occurred at the YMCA. Alongside her husband and older son, she rushed to the site and when the family arrived, Carter was conscious and sitting up.
She says the family is grateful for the hard work of emergency personnel on-scene and for the quick-thinking of her son’s friend Benjamin.
“For a 10-year-old to be able to have that ability to think quickly and remain calm in a situation like that; we are just so happy and so grateful that Carter has good friends that are watching out for him,” she remarks.
Michaela Mcfarlane was one of the lifeguards who pulled Carter out of the water.
“When you’re working at a pool, you’re only as strong as your team and at the YMCA in Lethbridge, we have a very strong team. We all support each other and work really well, especially when the situations are emergent,” Mcfarlane says.
She adds when Carter started breathing again, it led to “immediate relief”.
CELEBRATING HEROES
On Friday, September 27, a ceremony was held at the downtown Lethbridge fire station.
The two boys and their families were on-hand, along with lifeguards, Dr. Derman and Nicholas Spencer, who says it is very special getting to meet people responders can help save after the initial incident.
“You do have a bond with them, and it never leaves, you always have it and it’s pretty cool and a great experience. It’s honestly the reason most people do this job,” Spencer says.
“No one likes going to one where you have a negative outcome; we have too many of those so it’s really nice to experience something that has such a positive outcome to it.”
Embracing humility, Spencer adds, “We don’t do it for recognition, we do it for seeing that person later on [and] knowing that you made a difference in someone’s life. That’s huge, that’s something we all strive to do.”
Letters of commendation were distributed at Friday’s event, and Carter was able to hang a plaque inside the fire hall on what is known as the ‘Survivor Wall’. The assortment of plaques recognizes incidents that have had successful outcomes thanks to community partners and heroes and is headlined by the phrase, “It takes a community to save a life”.
Lethbridge Fire and Emergency Services adds this incident serves as a reminder of the importance and life-saving power of CPR. Officials say that statistics show immediate CPR can double or triple a person’s chance of survival in the event of a cardiac arrest.
