A 12-year-old was labeled a hero after saving her friend from drowning with nothing more than a fistful of her hair to hang onto.
The harrowing close call with Davy Jones comes to us now from Conwy, Wales, where Tamika and her friend Sofia-Ann were swimming off Pensarn beach during a late-May heat wave.
The BBC reported that the coastguard were alerted of three-teenagers cut-off from the beach by the tide. Rescue personnel were mobilized and were on their way when the worst seemingly happened.
Whether by the tide or a current, the girls lost their footing and were “dragged under.”
The reaper wasn’t kidding around that day in Wales, for at the exact moment that Sofia-Ann’s head went below the water, she appears to have had an epileptic seizure.
Quick thinking Tamika reached out and grabbed Sofia-Ann’s hair—the only part of her friend in reach—and dragged the unresponsive 14-year-old out of the water and back to the beach.
She was rushed to a hospital where her lungs had to be drained of seawater. Yet despite this, she survived.
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“I’m so grateful for Tamika. She put herself in more danger to save Sofia-Ann, she’s my little hero,” said Sofia-Ann’s mother, Jade McKenna.
The cause of the seizures, which continued in the ambulance, are being investigated.
“It was quite a shock,” said Tamika’s mother Shantika, who admitted her biggest fear is drowning. “Tamika got dragged under as well but she still focused on Sofia and getting her out of the water.”
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