ABC News is carrying the story today of Marine Staff Sgt. Michael Wert who drowned while saving two boys who were being carried away by a current in the Atlantic ocean.
David Greeson of Mebane, North Carolina was one of those boys and talks about what happened that day in May with Staff Sgt. Wert and his daughter saved his life.
“Sometimes I even think about the feeling of being dragged out to the ocean and then I just stop thinking about it because it’s so scary,” he said.
In early May, Greeson and his family went to the beach. Marine Master Sgt. Michael Wert was also at the beach with his wife, Debbie, and three children.
“The girls were flying a kite, and Mikey was playing in and out of the water in the sand,” Debbie Wert said.
Greeson and another boy were also playing in the water, when they suddenly realized a current was taking them away from shore.
“We’re not supposed to go past waist-deep water and I just realized that I was in water that was about this high, and …I kept trying to get back in but the current, just some kind of current or something kept pulling me back,” Greeson said.
Greeson’s mother, Pam Greeson, saw what was happening and began yelling for help.
“She was yelling and I don’t even remember what she said but I said, ‘Mike, I think those boys out there are in trouble,’” Debbie Wert said.
Michael Wert, an intelligence chief who served in the Gulf War and a 17-year Marine veteran, sprang into action as his wife called 911.
With the boys in tow, Wert was making his way back to shore.
“He was swimming pretty fine and then just suddenly stopped,” Greeson said.
The panicked boys continued on their own, when Wert’s 15-year-old daughter, Katrina, who had followed her father into the water, met the boys with a body board.
“That’s what helped. She said, ‘Get onto the body board and paddle,’” Greeson said. “When were close to shore, she was like, ‘What happened to my dad?’”
On shore, Debbie Wert was coming to the same horrifying conclusion.
“We saw the kids, and at that point I just saw three heads and it just kind of didn’t register until someone said, ‘We don’t see Mike out there anymore,’” she said.
Just 36 years old, Wert drowned while saving two lives.
“It didn’t matter if he knew who the person was or not. If they needed help he stopped and helped,” Debbie Wert said.
The Greesons say that Wert and his daughter, Katrina, are both heroes.
Pam Greeson said, “I thank God for him every day and for his daughter. She went out there right after her daddy did and risked her life just like her daddy did to save my son and that other boy.”
David Greeson owes his life to the father and daughter.
“If they weren’t out there I probably wouldn’t be sitting here talking,” he said.
crossposted at Conservative Thoughts
July 5th, 2007 at 6:37 pm
Marine Dies Saving Two Boys…
ABC News is carrying the story today of Marine Staff Sgt. Michael Wert who drowned while saving two boys who were being carried away by a current in the Atlantic ocean.
David Greeson of Mebane, North Carolina was one of those boys and talks about what …
July 6th, 2007 at 9:51 am
My heart goes out to all of those rescued and the marine’s family that lost their beloved father, husband, son, uncle & HERO. GREAT JOB! Katrina, if you and your father would not have been there for those boys they wouldn’t be here today.
It should be against the law for any child to play in the ocean without a secure boogy board or life jacket. A couple of years ago on vacation in Myrtle Beach we witnessed a man drown trying to save his son. The son was swept out into the ocean on his boogy board. The child was eventually able to swim sideways out of the current and survived. That same evening another father drowned trying to save his child that survived only because he was able to swim out of the current on his boogy board. We were told the next the day a lady had drowned. It really made me afraid of the currents in the ocean. My children were 9yrs old and 6yrs old at the time. I never had so much anxiety for their safety.