A quick-thinking lifeguard saved a 5-year-old boy from drowning
Wednesday afternoon, earning praise from Sheriff
’s Department deputies and his family.
A quick-thinking lifeguard saved a 5-year-old boy from drowning Wednesday afternoon, earning praise from Sheriff’s Department deputies and his family.
The incident occurred at 12:30 p.m. at Thousand Trails, an RV park on Uvas Road west of Morgan Hill. Deputy Rich Rutman said he received a call about a drowning victim, but when he arrived, firefighter/paramedics were caring for a “living 5-year-old boy.”
The lifeguard, Kevin Wallace, 20, of Gilroy, spotted the boy on the bottom of the shallow end of the pool, pulled him from the water, unconscious and not breathing, and began CPR. After three to five minutes the boy began to cough and to throw up water from his lungs. Paramedics arrived and took over.
The boy, whose name was not released, was taken by a Calstar helicopter to Santa Clara Valley Medical Center in San Jose.
The boy was not a resident of the park but was there on a school outing, officials said. No one from the RV park could say what school the boy attended.
“Kevin did everything right and saved this boy’s life,” Rutman said in a report to Terrance Helm, the Sheriff’s Department spokesman. “Kevin reacted with a professionalism and quick thinking under stress that I would hope any of our own deputies would do.”
Rutman said Kevin, a 2002 Gilroy High School graduate, got out of the way when paramedics arrived and never called attention to what he had done.
“Staff members had to point out who saved the boy,” Rutman said. “Kevin was humble and sincere in his duty as a lifeguard.”
Kevin is the son of Sheriff’s Deputy Gary Wallace and a student at Humboldt State University majoring in marine biology. Kevin said nothing like this has happened before in his four years of lifeguarding, but he knew what to do because of extensive training.
“It was just basic knowledge,” Kevin said after the rescue. “It was what I was taught.”
Besides a history of swim lessons, Kevin was also on the swimming and water polo teams in school, his father said.
Wallace said his supervisor, Lt. Dale Unger – also his brother-in-law – told him about Kevin’s heroism and that he should go to the scene. Wallace normally works in the Warrants Division.
“Kevin was extremely relieved to see the kid responding,” his father said.
Rutman recommended that Kevin be given a citation “worthy of his act,” which he described as heroism.
‘‘I’m extremely proud of my son,” Wallace said.
