When Emily Churchill heard a panicked scream while enjoying a day at the beach with her friend, she says, “instincts took over.”
It’s a good thing it did because, in seconds, a 12-year-old had been pulled out to sea by a powerful rip current.
“I noticed a head out in the water, which was getting pulled out very quickly. When I saw her moving out further and faster, I started running as quickly as I could,” Churchill says.
Churchill is the nurse behind the brave rescue Global News reported happened last Wednesday at Conrad Beach, just over half an hour east of Halifax.
Twelve-year-old Fiona Poulin was at the beach that day with her friend and friend’s mom and the girls had been getting out of the water when she was hit by a large wave that pulled her into the rip current and carried her out to sea.
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Churchill, an off-duty nurse, ran into the water without hesitating to help the young swimmer …