Garda rewarded for saving woman’s life

A NORTHSIDE Garda who helped save a woman from
drowning in January was honoured last week at a special awards ceremony in
Dublin Castle.

Garda Stephen Moore and his wife Emer were presented
with a Seiko Rescue Appreciation Award at the annual event organised by the
Irish Water Safety association to recognise people who have assisted in rescues
around the country.

Garda Moore was off duty on the night of January 2,
2011, when he and his wife Emer went for a stroll along the Clontarf seafront.

Although darkness had already fallen, they spotted a
woman walking along exposed sand on a route not normally taken by walkers,
where the tide can arrive in quickly and take people unawares.

Concerned for her safety, Garda Moore rang the Irish
Coast Guard on 999 to alert them about the lone walker and the risk she faced
of getting caught in the incoming tide.

Volunteer team members from the Howth Coast Guard unit
and gardaí from Raheny responded quickly with search parties sent out to comb
the shoreline along the Bull Wall and the Clontarf seafront.

Shortly afterwards, the woman was spotted about one
kilometre off the seafront by a high-powered torch used by one of the Coast
Guard search teams.

With the tide now turning, the woman who had turned
back to the seafront was finding herself surrounded by water.

The Dun Laoghaire RNLI lifeboat was en route, but a
series of landbanks in the area made it difficult to access the woman by boat.

At this stage she was also too far from the ground
teams to attempt a land-based rescue.

The woman, who was eventually hoisted from two metres
of freezing water by the winch man on Coast Guard Helicopter Rescue 116, was
already suffering from hypothermia.

She was transferred to Coast Guard ground teams on the
seafront and passed over to a waiting Dublin Fire Brigade ambulance who brought
her to hospital, where she made a good recovery.

At last week’s award ceremony, Stephen and Emer
Moore’s quick thinking in making that 999 call was praised by Coast Guard
staff.

Although it was initially just a concerned call, it
turned into a dramatic rescue that could have ended very differently.