April 20, 2019
Yesterday on the way
back from LA, my 9 year old daughter Paloma saved my life.
We had gone down to
stay at my son’s property in the Mojave Desert for Spring break.
Paloma loves the desert and after three wonderful days there we drove
to Los Angeles and spent time with my eldest son and his fiance. We
went to dinner, stayed overnight and had a nice long breakfast at an
LA coffee shop.
It had been a good
week and at 11:30 am we started the long drive up Highway 5 to
Oakland and home. Traffic was heavy in LA as usual. But once out of
LA County it moved pretty well. We stopped in Canyon Country and
then again and again. We had our dog Bella and we stopped every hour
or so, so Bella could stretch her legs and run around for a bit. The
last stop we made we were lucky to find a Baja Fresh and have tacos
for lunch that weren’t that bad. Bella got to run around and we
had a break.
But a few miles
further down the highway my eyes began to droop. I fought it a
little bit but at 72 years old I need my naps, particularly after
lunch. I pulled over at an off ramp that was just a two lane road
going off in either direction from the interstate. We parked in an
area, flattened by farm equipment and the big tractor trailer trucks
using it as a quiet rest stop. I parked our car about 50 yards in
from the road. It was all weedy around us. There was an irrigation
canal that ran parallel to the road a further 75 yards from where we
had parked. It was a good space for the dog to run in.
The dog took off
running through the weeds and Paloma chasing after her. I put the
windows down on the car and put the seat back a little. It was warm
in the Valley, there was a nice breeze and I thought after a few
minutes I’d probably nod off. Paloma would be fine, she knew to
wake me if she needed me. I started to play solitaire on my phone.
I’d didn’t fall asleep so easily and we were there for awhile.
From the canal I could see water splashing up above the berm, a pump
or something.
I looked around,
Paloma was playing in the weeds and I didn’t see the dog. I got
out of the car and asked Paloma where Bella was. We both started
calling Bella and she didn’t come. I remembered the splashes I
could see just over the canal berm. Oh no, I thought. Bella loves
water. A year ago we got Bella as a rescue dog when she was a year
old, a ¾ size German Shepherd shaped mixed breed. I have no idea
where her love of water came from, but she ran every creek she
crossed and once even started swimming out into the Columbia River
chasing ducks.
I ran to the canal
imagining the worst, that she had floated away and out of sight and
hoping she would be there. Paloma and I got to the top of the berm
at the same moment and there was Bella splashing to get out, but the
canal had a thick plastic liner that came up and over the berm. She
couldn’t get any traction. The splashes had been her struggling
and she had been in there for at least ten minutes and probably more.
I’m not sure how dogs look so expressive but the look on Bella’s
face was pure panic turning to relief at our arrival.
I laid on the berm
and tried to grab her, the current was very strong and she was
paddling as hard as she could to get to me, but her paws kept
slipping on the thick plastic liner and she floated in and out. I
reached down to grab her and I could touch her nose but I was a few
inches from being able to get a grip on her collar. She tried and I
tried and I reached out just a little further and slid into the
canal.
The water was cold
and I had to swim to stay where I was. Like Bella I couldn’t get
any traction on the plastic liner. It rose a good 2 or 3 feet above
my head. I tried to push Bella up on to it but she just kept sliding
into the canal. Where I was at the bank I think the canal was about
6, 6 ½ feet deep and it seemed to be deepen a little more toward the
center. A few feet down the side of the canal there was a metal
plate about 2 feet by 2 feet half submerged. It was secured by small
screws with heads that I could just barely grip one between my thumb
and forefinger.
I held myself
against the current that way and grabbed Bella by the collar and
tried to push her up the plate. The traction wasn’t much better
than the liner but on the third try she was able to get her paws on
the top of the berm and Paloma pulled her out. Now I’m in the
canal, the water is cold, I have to tread water to stay in place and
I try to scramble up the plate but finger grips are just not enough
and Paloma is too small to pull me out. I tell her to go to the car
and get something to pull me out, a shirt maybe. I don’t know if
that’s going to work, but at least we can try and she won’t come
so close she might slip down the liner. Paloma said, “How about
the dog leash?”
“Yeah get the dog
leash.” That will be better, but I don’t know how a 75 pound
girl is going to pull a 215 pound grown man out of the water, but
we’ll try it.
While she’s gone I
look around and there doesn’t seem to be any break in the bank and
liner. The canal goes into a tunnel about 150 yards west of me. If
I can’t get out in the next few minutes I’ll send her back to the
car to call 9-1-1. Paloma came back and dangles the leash down to
me. I tell her to sit down on the ground off the berm and hold on to
the leash. She gives it to me and I pull a little bit, but even a
little bit and she starts to come up.
I tell her, “No,
lay down flat on the ground and hold the leash as hard as you can.”
I really don’t think it’s going to work and I certainly don’t
want to pull her in. She gets the leash to me one more time and I
pull and try to leap out of the water at the same time and I get just
far enough to get an arm on to the top of the berm and a little more
with my torso mostly out of the water and get my fingers to the edge
of the liner and pull myself out.
Paloma, Bella the
dog and I are excited together; I’ve been rescued. Not so hard but
I didn’t think it was going to work and I was pretty surprised and
relieved to find myself out of the canal. It was probably going to
be OK all along, but I never knew that for sure until Paloma got me
out. I looked down the canal and there were yellow painted steel
poles four of them in front of the tunnel. Maybe something there
might have been enough to scramble out, maybe not, was there going to
be downward suction? On the other side of the road in the field
somebody was working a tractor and moving dirt. There was a house on
the other side of the road a few hundred yards back and after I was
out a truck came out and passed on our side of the road. I waved to
the farmer.
I realized there
were probably a number of ways I could have gotten out of the canal.
But I couldn’t do it myself. And Paloma had done it, had saved me,
gotten me out of the canal.
I’m a retired
first responder and this situation was just the kind of thing I
responded to and saved people from their own mistakes, that moment
when you realize you’ve reached too far and you slide down the berm
into the water. I was sure everything would be OK as I kept my head
above the water in the cold canal, but I also knew that when things
start to go bad sometimes they can go very badly and this is the way
tragic accidents start. But it didn’t become a tragic accident, it
probably wouldn’t have gone that way, but it didn’t because
Paloma saved my life.
