Duncan O. C. Harris

Duncan O. C. Harris helped to save a boy from drowning, Emerald Isle, North Carolina, July 28, 2015. While swimming in the Atlantic Ocean, a 13-year-old boy was caught by a strong current that took him farther from shore and kept him from returning in the choppy water. At a point about 350 feet from shore, he called for help. From a house along the beach where he was vacationing, Harris, 21, construction worker, was alerted to the boy’s plight. He ran to the water and entered, wading, joining another man who was responding. Together the men swam a diagonal course of about 450 feet to the boy, who was then floating on his back. The other man had the boy hold to a rescue tube that he had taken with him, and Harris grasped the boy and helped him maintain his hold. Swimming against the current at first, the other man towed the tube toward shore, Harris aiding by swimming as best he could while securing the boy. On reaching wadable water, Harris and the other man walked the boy to the beach, where he was treated by arriving emergency medical personnel. Harris was checked at the scene but shortly suffered ill effects of the rescue and required hospital treatment. He recovered in a day.

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