From: The Orange County Register
‘This guy probably would have died’: Lifeguard lessons pay off for Huntington Beach teen
Maddie Camargo, 17, who is training to be a lifeguard, likely saved a man’s life during a recent kayak trip out in the wilderness. The man had a compound fracture and was losing blood. She was able to stem the flow of blood and keep him calm until help arrived.
Maddie Camargo and her mother, Stephanie Dufour, thought the screams for help were just a few Boy Scouts messing around.
But then they saw the scene: scouts surrounding a hiker who had taken a gnarly, 20-foot drop in an area near Hoover Dam, a spill that left his right arm with a bone sticking out from it, a fractured pelvis, and a broken wrist and hand. Then there was the severed artery, right by his bicep, gushing blood and filling the bottom of the canoe.
The mother and daughter from Huntington Beach were supposed to be having a fun-filled weekend in early April to celebrate Camargo’s 17th birthday. But the kayaking trip turned into an emergency lifesaving adventure for the young Orange County lifeguard.