It was a big day just last week for Greystones man Alastair Jones, when he and his family travelled into the big city to pick up his Bravery Certificate.
A resident of Charlesland, Alastair currently works in the control room of the HSE ambulance service and was a member of the Greystones Coast Guard. So, no better man for the task at hand when, on July 16th 2011, Alastair saw a three-year-old boy being swept out to sea by a freak wave at Seapoint.
Without hesitation, Alastair jumped into the water, swam out to the boy, and brought him safely back to shore. It was, said the Greystones man, a simple case of “not thinking at all. I saw his head in the water.”
And that was that. Alastair was in the water too.
“He had gone under a couple of times,” he explains, “and we both went under again as we made our way back to the shore. It felt like an age to get back. I grabbed the slipway and someone reached in and took the boy out.”
Nominated by a fellow paramedic, Alastair attended the award ceremony last week at Farmleigh House with his proud wife, Katie, and two very proud parents.