A swimmer who used his Apple Watch to call for help after being dragged a kilometre out to sea says he has no idea if it will work.
Rick Sherman headed to his local beach in Byron Bay for a swim early Saturday morning, but things quickly took a turn for the worse.
“I was actually actively looking for some nice waves and found them, but after I was in the water for about 20 minutes, things started to get a little rough,” Rick said. today.
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Rick tried to get back to shore but the strong waves kept hitting him and he started struggling.
“I was feeling suffocated, out of breath, out of energy — and I hadn’t even had my morning Wheaties yet,” he said.
“I couldn’t take it any longer on the head, I needed to get out of there so I headed straight back behind the waves.”
This move helped Rick get out of immediate trouble with the waves, but he ended up hundreds of feet from shore and realized he was in trouble.
“I was trying to stay calm and find a place in the waves so I could get back to shore but it was so big – it was impossible,” he said.
“I had to think about what other options I had to get out of this situation, and then I looked at my watch and thought it must have some kind of SOS feature.”
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But Rick said he doesn’t think his watch was part of his master phone plan, and he has no idea whether the emergency call would have worked.
“I had no reason to look at this feature before, but I worked it out quickly and got a call to the emergency services and I had no idea exactly where I was, I just told them I was at the back of Byron Bay,” he said.
Fortunately, the crew were quick to act and a rescue helicopter was sent from the Gold Coast to assist.
Alex Carroll was on the helicopter and told today Time was of the essence to help Rick.
“We were airborne within minutes and obviously the site was only ten minutes from the Gold Coast so it was very time critical for us in the rescue operation,” he said.
But the crew reaches Rick in time and he tells Alex that he owes him his life.
“I am so grateful to you and all the efforts of all the agencies, staff and volunteers involved, it has been an incredible, smooth and efficient effort,” he said.
“Just the fact that I was able to make that emergency call from my watch, I don’t really know how that happened, but it definitely got me out of trouble.”
Watch the full conversation with Rick and Alex in the video above.
