Calgary ‘hero’ saves woman from frozen lake

Just before noon on Sunday, as he was driving past Elliston Park in southeast Calgary, 27-year-old Stuart Harris spotting a woman struggling in the park's small lake.

"I saw someone in the pond," he told the Metro. "I drove past, pulled a U-turn and came out running."

While attempting to rescue two of her three dogs — both had fallen through the lake's thin ice — Jennifer Simmonds, 37, had also crashed through the ice into the frigid waters.

"We have no kids, our dogs are our kids," Simmonds told the Calgary Sun. "I knew I was going in, there was no question."

Simmonds managed to get her two dogs out of the water. Then her third dog fell in.

Bystanders gathered at the river's edge, but none dared to walk out on the ice.

Harris, however, didn't hesitate to come to her rescue. The Calgary Herald reported that Harris jumped out of his car, grabbed a tow strap from his trunk, and ran to the shore.

"The ice along the shoreline is thinner because it thaws out so I knew to jump across that and basically glide across the ice to make it to her," he said.

"I made a loop out of the tow strap and then crawled out to meet her, threw the tow strap over her shoulders and told her the put them underneath her armpits," he told the Calgary Sun.

He told the Metro that Simmonds was too numb to grasp the strap herself, so he looped it around her.

As he started to pull her in, two Calgary police officers arrived. They helped Harris pull Simmonds to shore.

Simmonds was taken to the hospital where she was treated for hypothermia. Her third dog was able to swim to shore on its own.

Harris told the Calgary Herald that he had some survival training through a wilderness course he took. It included some ice training:

"I knew I had to keep calm, not panic, not do any violent movements. Stay as flat as possible. To help her out and not get pulled in as well."

"I just feel like anybody else. I hope if I fell through the water somebody would help me out too. I’m just…glad I got to help someone," he said, adding that he doesn't consider himself a hero.

Calgary police Staff Sergeant John McCarthy, however, begs to differ:

"This is just one of those events that make you proud to be a Calgarian. This citizen, without any thought…did what needed to be done. He didn’t wait for other people. He took great risk to himself to really save this lady’s life."