LIHUE — Friday night, Josiah Millen watched his friend Charles Perez sit up, breathe and talk.
He almost couldn’t believe it.
“It’s a miracle,” the 18-year-old Millen said in a phone interview as he sat at Wilcox Medical Center. “He’s doing very good in a day’s worth of time.”
And he says the lifeguards who saved Perez saved him as well.
“Definitely, without them being there, I’m 100 percent certain without them we would be dead,” he said.
A little more than 24 hours earlier, Millen, his brother Trenton Torres and Perez, all who live in Washington state, were body surfing on a sunny afternoon at Kealia Beach Park, about 100 feet from shore, when Perez cried out for help.
Millen swam to Perez, who was struggling in a rip current. The 140-pound Millen tried to keep the 180-pound Perez above the water.
“He’s a lot bigger than me. I’m doing anything I can to keep him up,” Millen said. “So while I’m trying to do that, I’m drowning.”
Millen managed to get the attention of a woman on the beach, who alerted lifeguards that three men were in trouble.
In minutes, a lifeguard was there and grabbed Perez. Another lifeguard, Millen said, helped him and his brother.
“We were also going under,” he said. “If the lifeguard didn’t give me and my brother the red floatie thing they had, I probably would have drowned, too.”
According to the county, a lifeguard roving the beach on an ATV was notified by Kealia tower of the distressed swimmers, with one of the men seen unresponsive in the water. With assistance from a nearby off-duty lifeguard, ocean safety officials quickly responded and assisted the men to shore, a county press release said.
Once on shore, lifeguards began administering CPR on Perez. They applied an automated external defibrillator with shock advised, and continued CPR until firefighters and American Medical Response medics arrived.
After continued resuscitation efforts, Perez regained a pulse and was transported to Wilcox Medical Center.
Millen called the lifesaving measures “pretty incredible.”
“They stepped up and saved his life,” he said.
Millen and Torres have been friends with Perez since childhood. Torres and Perez, both 21, attended the same school.
“I call him my brother,” Millen said.
The three were on a quick trip to Kauai and had been body surfing for a few hours at Kealia before taking a break, and were planning to leave. Then, they decided “might as well stay here and chill in the sun,” and ventured back out.
While the ocean seemed calm earlier, in the afternoon the currents were stronger, Millen said. The county said lifeguards had notified the men of the dangerous rip currents near the south end of the beach.
Millen said he and his brothers, who have relatives on Kauai, are good swimmers. Perez is not.
Perez, who had been riding a wave, was suddenly being pulled out by a rip current and was yelling for Torres.
Millen reached him first, and said Perez was inhaling a lot of water and panicking.
“The only reason I’m still alive, I knew if I started to panic, I could die,” he said.
On shore, he said it was tough seeing Perez in his condition as lifeguards performed lifesaving measures. Foam was coming out of his nose and mouth and he wasn’t breathing.
“Stuff like that you can’t unsee,” an emotional Millen said.
As lifeguards worked on Perez, Millen said both he and his brother were upset and scared. He led his brother from the scene to calm him down and “let the lifeguards do what they did.”
“They came through,” he said.
They didn’t know until Friday, however, that Perez would be all right.
Doctors told them Thursday night when Perez first came in that they were worried because he wasn’t moving his arms or legs. When he finally did, they were confident he would recover.
Saturday morning, Perez had cleared the worst of it.
“Knowing that he is going to be alive, he is going to be OK, we were so happy,” Millen said.
Perez doesn’t remember much of what happened. He remembers calling for Torres, then remembers waking up in the hospital.
Millen was amazed Perez was sitting up and talking Friday night. The day before he had literally died and was brought back by his rescuers.
“It’s crazy,” Millen said. “I don’t even know what to say.”
Both Millen and Torres returned home on a flight Saturday morning. Perez stayed in the hospital, with relatives arriving to be with him. He’ll return home once he’s fully recovered.
“I’m good,” Millen said. “Me and my brother, yesterday, were pretty cooked, roughed up.”
Millen said he was hoping to speak to the lifeguards to thank them personally for what they did. He will never forget it.
“There is no doubt in my mind they saved our lives,” he said.
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Bill Buley, editor-in-chief, can be reached at 245-0457 or bbuley@thegardenisland.com.
