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Grant Campbell
Bravery Awards and Soldiers Beach Mass Rescue
Easter Sunday Mass Rescue at Soldiers Beach
- Date: 27 March 2005
- Location: Soldiers Beach, Norah Head, NSW, Australia
- Patrol #4 Members:
- Michael Raby: Club Captain, Patrol Captain, IRB Driver
- Amanda Lafferty: IRB Crew
- Jae Holbrook: Radio Operations - Closed the beach, Reported the rescue
- Brady Holbrook: Board Rescue - Saved 1 person
- Grant Campbell: Swim Rescue - Saved 4 people
- Glen Coppen: Swim Rescue - Saved 2 people
- Michael Rixom: Swim Rescue - Saved 2 people
- The mass rescue that ensued:
- saved the lives of 9 people
- Grant Campbell single-handedly swam 4 people (with one celebrating her 14th birthday) back to shore, all at once, over a 20 minute period, with 1 rescue tube and 1 flipper and was thereafter known within the surf club as "The Swimmer".
- was performed in 12 foot (3.7 metre) waves
- 800 people were on the beach
- 200 of them were watching from the rock platform
- was recognized in the top 20 rescues on Australian beaches in the prior 50 years
- The entire patrol was later recognized with the following bravery awards:
- "SLSA Certificate of Merit with Silver Medallion Insert" by Surf Life Saving Australia. Under Surf Life Saving Australia guidelines, the Silver Medallion insert is the highest tier of SLSA Meritorious Award. It is granted only when there is a "very high level of risk to rescuer, combined with optimal application of skills," and where the outcome for the patients without the rescue attempt would have resulted in "definite fatality".
- NSW Water Safety Awards held at Coogee Beach Surf Life Saving Club
The following article was originally published in the Central Coast Express Advocate newspaper in 2005.
Swimmers owe lives to brave seven
Article by HEATHER PILLANS
The lives of nine people were saved on Easter Sunday thanks to the quick actions of seven Soldiers Beach surf lifesavers.
Shortly after 2pm a "freak" set of waves created a "one-off" rip that dragged nine people dangerously close to the rocks at the northern end of Soldiers Beach.
In the first major rescue at the beach in 10 years, four volunteers grabbed rescue tubes and a surf board and plunged into the huge surf to save the seven children and two adults.
Three other volunteers stayed on the beach to coordinate rescue operations and carry out retrieval using the inflatable rescue boat.
Soldiers Beach Surf Lifesaving Club captain Mick Raby said conditions were treacherous all day.
"It was a freakish set of conditions where a set of waves created a flash rip that sucked nine people out 50m in maybe 15 seconds," he said.
Lifesaver Grant Campbell managed to keep four people including two young girls afloat on a tube made for one person.
He was followed into the water by patrol captain Glen Coppen who kept two teenage girls afloat with his tube. The three swam out to sea and were later retrieved from the water by Mick Raby and Amanda Lafferty, 16, who was operating the rescue boat.
Twins Brady and Jae Holbrook, 16, and, Michael Rixom, 15, also went into the water and swam the farthest to retrieve the remainder of those stranded.
"Michael picked up a young boy and girl on his tube and did the same thing as Glen swam out with the rip," Mr Raby said.
Brady pulled the final person, an adult male, on to his rescue board and waited for the rescue boat. The whole time Brady's twin brother Jae was directing the operation from the beach.
Picture: WAIDE MAGUIRE
Lifesavers' scary wait to be saved
While Michael Rixom was trying to keep himself and two young children afloat during a dramatic sea rescue at Soldiers Beach on Easter Sunday, he wondered whether he would make it back to shore.
"I was struggling for a while," he said of his wait while the inshore rescue boat attempted to navigate the treacherous seas to get closer to them.
Grant Campbell said: "I was wondering whether we would be able to get away from the rocks."
Each of the four rescuers who went into the surf in a bid to save nine people caught in a rip had different worries.
"I was just trying to figure out how I could get the guy to a safe place," Brady Holbrook said of his attempt to save an adult male.
"We were getting pounded at the same time and there was no way we were going to get back in."
Glen Coppen said, once he'd reached the two girls he saved, his biggest challenge was to keep them calm.
But for Jae Holbrook, just remaining on the beach was a challenge. "I wanted to get out there and help but I knew I couldn't," he said.
