A FRANKSTON High School student chosen to take part in a surf life saving program has used his skills to help save a young boy from drowning.
The United Energy-sponsored surf life saving program sees Portsea Surf Life Saving Club members visit high schools to deliver water safety lessons. Late last month, a group of students from Frankston High School who have taken part in the program visited the Sorrento foreshore to pass on their knowledge to the local Nippers.
Year 12 student Henry Code, who was among the teachers in Sorrento, put his skills to use last year when he jumped into a pool to save a young child. The boy’s father, United Energy head of network control and operations Christopher Murn, said “my six-year-old, who would have been five at the time, just decided to jump into the deep end of the pool with all his clothes on.” “Luckily Henry was there,” Murn said. “It’s just great to see through that random connection, six degrees of separation, that you’re making the community safer.”
Code said “I wouldn’t have been aware of what to do I don’t think without the [life saving] program.” “My little sister and Chris’ son are pretty good friends living across the road from each other. They were just playing around the pool and Alexander fell in the deep end, which was probably a bit of a fright to him. I saw him splashing around in the water so I jumped in and pulled him out and he was all good from there.”
Henry Kiss from the Portsea Surf Life Saving Club helps administer the water safety initiative. He said “the program has been running for about three years now.” “We run programs at schools from Crib Point, Hastings, Balnarring, Somers, Tootgarook – we are trying to get to as many schools as we can,” he said.
First published in the Frankston Times – 3 December 2024