Teens owe life to heroes
Teenagers Samuel Stockdale and Tala Machlouch are strangers and different in many ways but they share one important connection - they are alive because a loved one knew what to do when they were pulled lifeless from the water as toddlers.
Both were too young to remember much but the image of their limp, wet bodies will never leave their families.
Samuel's mother Emily had terrifying nightmares for nine years after that night in Kings Park in 2003 when she watched her husband Bruce resuscitate their son for more than 18 minutes.
For Sarah Machlouch, now a mother of two young girls, her most vivid childhood memory is of seeing her baby sister face-down in the family pool in Thornlie in 1998.
Bruce, a former policeman, was trained in resuscitation but had never had to use it until he breathed life back into his son.
Sarah was only nine when she hauled Tala out of the water. She mimicked the chest compressions and mouth-to-mouth she had seen on her favourite TV show ER before her father rushed to help.
Both saved a life that day and were featured in _The West Australian _ for their quick thinking.
Since then, the rescues have shaped their lives in different ways but both are adamant that their knowledge of resuscitation, however basic, is why Samuel and Tala, now 13 and 17, had the opportunity to grow up. The Stockdales were having a barbecue with another family, chatting while the kids played, when Bruce realised he could not see his youngest son.
He ran to the nearby pond and found Samuel, 20 months old, floating on his back with his face submerged.
He started compressions and mouth-to-mouth, all the while terrified he would damage his son's tiny body. After 15 minutes, exhausted and with no signs of life from Samuel, Bruce said he contemplated the unthinkable.
After 18 minutes, Samuel began to gurgle and breathe, just a little, but didn't wake up. The ambulance arrived and Bruce and Emily spent the night in the hospital.
Samuel woke the next day, confused about why he was in hospital but otherwise fine. He told his parents he had been chasing ducks.
Sarah Machlouch, who took up nursing to help save lives, remembers her parents' grief after 17-month-old Tala almost drowned.
She had been minding her sister when she was momentarily distracted and Tala found her way into the water.
Sarah did about three minutes of CPR and even after the ambulance arrived, she was scared she would not see her sister again.
"They told us she would either die or be brain dead but she reacted really well and woke up on the third day, asking for Dad," she said.
Tala, who just finished her HSC, wants to follow her sister into nursing.
