Good Samaritan pulls 2 kids from retention pond
INDIANAPOLIS (WISH) — Two children were still in the hospital Wednesday night after being found in a retention pond on the northwest side of Indianapolis.
A good Samaritan is being credited with pulling them out.
It happened just after 4 p.m. Tuesday on Granada Circle North in the Cold Spring Estates Subdivision.
Kathy Szurkiewicz, 41, believes she was at the right place at the right time. She volunteers at a nearby school and was getting ready to leave. But for some reason she decided to stay longer and that’s when she heard a little girl screaming for help.
Szurkiewicz told 24-Hour News 8 she couldn’t sleep Tuesday night just thinking about what happened to a 9-year-old boy and his 12-year-old sister at this pond.
“I see the water,” she said. “It’s like a nightmare.”
Szurkiewicz was at the MTI School of Knowledge, which is near the pond, when a girl ran up to her screaming that her friends were in trouble.
“She said, ‘The kids are drowning in the pond’, and I ran,” she said. “I jumped into the pond with all my clothing.”
The water came up all the way to her neck. Szurkiewicz said panic set in but she knew she had to find those kids.
“All I saw jackets,” she said. “I did not know that the kids were there.”
She grabbed their jackets and pulled them to shore with the girl resting on her chest and the boy facing up. By this time the boy was unresponsive. Once on shore, she said another good Samaritan performed CPR on the boy.
He became alert again and was taken to the hospital.
“It could have been my kids,” she said. “I’m thankful that people came forward to help. I wish the family the best.”
As to how the kids got into the water, the girl told firefighters her brother wanted to go swimming. She told him “no” but said he didn’t listen.