A hero English teacher who almost died trying to save a five-year-old boy from downing is haunted by his mother’s screams.
Bernard Riedl dived off a wharf in his underwear when he heard the child had fallen off the jetty and been washed out to sea on a North Auckland beach on Saturday.
The 28-year-old swam through the choppy waters to reach the stricken boy and tried to haul him in shore, but struggled to stay afloat.
Bernard Riedl, 28, dived off a wharf in his underwear trying to save a five-year-old boy from drowning at an Auckland beach, but wasn’t strong enough to pull him from the choppy water
Wharf in Torpedo Bay, North Auckland, where the boy fell from and Mr Riedl dived in to save him
‘I swam to him and he put his hands around my neck, hanging on for dear life. But it was so rough, and I could feel myself drowning. I was trying to make sure both of us could get air,’ he told Sunday Star Times.
‘I’d suck in water, but had to keep going. I tried lying on my back, but at that point he detached. I was so weak by that point that I couldn’t do anything and I thought I was going to die.’
After losing the boy and spending about 10 minutes on the water he eventually washed up on the shore and walked back along the beach.
There he found out the coast guard pulled the boy from the water but was unable to revive him about 3.15pm.
Mr Riedl said he would ‘always feel bad’ about not being able to save the boy’s life and though he never saw his family he was haunted by the mother’s screams
The English teacher, who returned from working in Russia three weeks earlier, wondered why no one at the busy New Zealand beach came to help them
Mr Riedl said he would ‘always feel bad’ about not being able to save the boy’s life and though he never saw his family he was haunted by the mother’s screams.
‘It was all I could hear… the most horrible screams,’ he said.
The English teacher, who returned from working in Russia three weeks earlier, wondered why no one at the busy New Zealand beach came to help them.
Police said the boy’s death would be investigated by the coroner.