Two young Tasmanian brothers have helped save the life of a four-year-old boy they found at the bottom of a Cairns caravan park pool.
13-year-old Hudson and his brother Marley, 10, are Nippers with the Carlton Park Surf Life Saving Club in Tasmania’s southern beaches.
Their family has spent the past 16 months travelling Australia in a caravan.
Earlier this week, the boys were going down the slides with family friends at the caravan park where they were staying when they noticed something on the bottom of the pool.
Their mother, Samantha Lancaster, told Pulse Marley swam down to take a closer look. He came back up and said: “It’s a kid. What am I meant to do?”
“He’s only 10, so he wouldn’t have been able to do what Huddy did, but Huddy had dived down,” she said.
Hudson pulled the boy off the bottom of the pool and brought him over to his mother.
Lancaster said the child was unconscious. She took him out of Hudson’s arms, went to the end of the pool and called for help from other people around the pool.
A man took the boy from her, laid him on the ground and told her his wife was a nurse.
Within moments the nurse was beside the boy, assessing him and starting CPR as she and her husband worked on him.
“He was just a little fella,” Lancaster said. “It was just so lucky there was a nurse swimming with her family.”
Lancaster said the nurse “brought him back to life” and described the rescue as “a really good team effort”.
“The boys were heroes. They were heroic,” she said.
She said many other people helped too. A family friend, Nath, went straight to the other side of the pool to call for help.
Her best friend looked after her children at the side of the pool while the adults helped the boy.
Lancaster said the caravan park shouted the boys dinner and gave them a couple of tops and staff “kept saying how much Hudson was a hero for what he did”.
Carlton Park Surf Life Saving Club said the brothers showed “remarkable bravery, awareness and leadership beyond their years”.
The club said its Nipper program teaches children water safety skills, decision-making and “how to remain calm under pressure”.
“We are so proud of Hudson and Marley for their courage and the way they represented our CP community,” the club said.
“Congratulations to both for being true heroes.”
The family plans to return to Tasmania once their travels are over.
