Bog Walk heroine saves drowning man

Spurred on by her own near-death experience at age eight, hero diver Zina Slew says she is happy to continue saving lives without payment.

News broke Monday morning that the Bog Walk, St Catherine, resident, who saved five persons from a watery grave last year, had rescued yet another person who was trapped in his vehicle while it slowly sank to the bottom of the Rio Cobre in the vicinity of the Flat Bridge. According to Slew, it was about 9:30 a.m. when her daily routine was interrupted by the near tragedy.

"I come down morning time to carry out my goats and I happen to move away from this location. I was on my phone then I hear the whole commotion like something scraping on the road," she said. "When I look I saw the car in the water, front down. I was on the phone so I say, 'A car went over' and I just start run."

She beckoned for her sister Cassandra, who is also a rescue diver. Within moments, Cassandra was running towards her with a hatchet and two life jackets.

"When she finally come now is like the whole body of the car was in the water so is just the back part now [still showing]. So that's where we coulda use the hatchet wid a impact to actually break the glass," said Slew.

But she admitted that her hope started to fade that they would save the man, now known to them as Don.

"I woulda say it took about half hour, 20 to 30 minutes because he was in the vehicle a long time. I give up thinking that he would even come out alive. So when my sister come with the hatchet, we're just saying we're gonna take him out anyway, even just to perform CPR or so but not thinking that he was still breathing," she said. "When I took him out and I realised he was still alive, I started to hug him. I was so happy, I was like 'Yes, he's alive' to everybody. I was so happy. I think my sister say I was crying but I don't know. She say tears drop outta me eye but I don't remember that." Slew said that she taught her children to swim when they were young as she recalled her own rescue years ago.

"Nothing else really motivates me, I'm just doing it because it's just a act of the moment. You cyah just stand up and say 'I'm not going into water, I'm just gonna make them drown'. No! It's like you can't resist it," she said. Slew advised motorists navigating Flat Bridge to remove their seatbelts and wind down their windows.

"Yesterday [Monday], I was so upset when I got into the water to save this guy and the windows were up. Once the car get into the water, the doors cannot open. If he's inside him can't even open him own door because then again he is panicked. But if the window is down, we can pull you through the window if you can swim or not," she said.

Slew also cautioned against reckless overtaking on the bridge. "A lot of reckless drivers drive here. Once they reach right there, they start to overtake," she said, gesturing to one of the bridge's entrances. "Mi a beg unuh stop. You can bad drive somebody and they're like 'you not passing me' and then you end up get into the river."