Exclusive:Partially blind former Royal Navy diver, 84, saves life of man in trouble in water at Sheffield park
“In no time at all, I could hear him shouting and splashing, before he shouted ‘help, help’.”
A retired Royal Navy veteran whose feats include swimming in the Marianas Trench rescued a young man from potentially drowning at a Sheffield park.
Terriss Davis, 84, who still enjoys a dip for exercise as often as five times a week and is partially deaf and partially blind, says his friends tell him time and time again not to go off wild swimming by himself.
But his habit meant the Hillsborough pensioner was ready to spring into action when he heard a voice shouting “help” in the water at Crookes Valley Park on Saturday, May 23.
Terriss said: “They were in trouble, no question about that, and the only thing was to make sure they were somewhere safe.
“I went up for a swim on Saturday (May 23) and there’s a concrete jetty for diving off where there was this young man getting ready.
“He could only have been in his 20s or maybe a student.
“He asked me if it was safe and what depth it was - I told him it was deep all over.
“I don’t think he was a very confident swimmer.
“I got in, and just as soon as I did I heard a splash as he went in.”
But shortly after, Terriss said he heard the tell-tale sounds of someone in trouble.
”The water was very cold,” the former Navy diver said: “When it’s cold, people struggle to regulate their breathing. People underestimate it.
“In no time at all, I could hear him shouting and splashing, before he shouted ‘help, help’.
“I swam across and made sure to swim behind him.
“I sort of shoved him in the back while holding him to get him back to the diving jetty.
“In about half a minute, another person appeared and that meant there was two of us to get him back.
“It could have so easily gone the other way.”
Terriss says the young swimmer seemed “out of it” when they lay him on the jetty, where people ran over to help.
He believes amateur divers and wild swimmers underestimate how cold water can shock the breath out from them.
Tragically, South Yorkshire sees fatalities in its reservoirs and ponds every year - including this week, with the death of Muhammad Secka in the water at Rother Valley Country Park on May 25. He was just 16.
Terriss himself swims with a group he met at Crookes Valley Park that includes a former national swimmer, Canadian national triathlete and several qualified lifeguards - but admits he goes off swimming by himself “more than I should.”
The 84-year-old served as a diver in the Royal Navy from 1964-1972, including service on the HMS Eagle, where his company was given the “all hands to bathe” opportunity to swim in the waters above the Marianas Trench.
Sheffield Council don’t permit swimming at Crookes Valley Park.
The Royal National Lifeboat Institution’s ‘Float To Live’ campaign warns anyone who gets into trouble in water to tilt their head back, relax, breath, and calmly hold their arms and legs out to float until rescue arrives.