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Man’s life saved – with a punch to the stomach
Thursday 5th May 2011, 8:00PM BST.
Paul Snook
A Shropshire businessman dived into a freezing canal to haul an unconscious man to safety, he revealed today. Paul Snook, 45, from Tenbury Wells, said he acted on impulse.
Mr Snook, who runs The Buzz music studio in Ludlow, tried to resuscitate the man, but when this failed he hit him in the stomach to force air into his lungs and bring him back to life.
He had been enjoying a boating trip with his partner Bernadette Bailey and her daughter Julie on the Worcester and Birmingham Canal when a walker fell in and sank to the bottom of the nine-feet-deep waterway.
Mr Snook, who suffers from painful fibromyalgia which means he has to use crutches to walk, said: “At first we though the splash was a dog that had fallen in but then a man shouted that his friend had fallen in and couldn’t swim.
“I kicked off my boots and dived in, but it took about half a dozen attempts to find him as he’d moved from where he’d gone in. The water was very cold and like brown soup, so when I opened my eyes I couldn’t see.
“Finally I got hold of him and dragged him to the surface and off to the bank, but when I touched his eyes nothing happened.
“I tried CPR but it was doing nothing. Then I remembered something a friend in the army once said and punched him hard in the stomach.
“He started coughing up water and came back to life — it was phenomenal.”
The 26-year-old victim, Brad Reagan from Worcester, had fallen in while trying to bypass a bridge by walking along a narrow beam.
West Midlands Ambulance Service attended the incident at 5pm on April 28 and took both men to hospital.
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