(WSVN) - A Florida shark fisherman is being hailed a hero after he saved a teenage girl that was caught in a rip current at Pensacola Beach.
Shark fisherman, Andrew Smith, had just clocked out of work last week when he reluctantly decided to head to Pensacola Beach to go fishing.
“I wasn’t even going to go out and then my friend convinced me to go,” said Smith.
But despite his hesitancy, he went anyway and just 10 minutes later—panic broke out.
“I was sitting there and this girl came running asking if anybody could swim, I said ‘no I absolutely could not swim’, and she was running and screaming and nobody could swim. Her friend was getting sucked more and more out, and I looked down at the drone and I was like, ‘well, the drone can swim but I can’t,” said Smith.
That’s when he sprung into action and flew his drone over the blue waters, even having to maneuver the strong winds.
“I ran up and grabbed one of those and ran back down to the drone, I flew it out and it was a terrible miss. I released it too early, it was really windy. Like it wasn’t close at all,” said Smith.
The teenage girl had been battling the rip current for five minutes but Smith didn’t give up.
Another bystander gave him a second flotation device to attach to the drone so the swimmer could hold on to it until pracademics arrived.
“I flew it back out and after the first one I could tell how windy it was. So then I lowered it down, you had to go slower and slower down to her because that was it. That was the last opportunity we were going to have,” he said.
His second drop was successful.
It took another five minutes after Smith dropped the device for first responders to make it on scene.
“If it wasn’t for that second drop, she wouldn’t of made it. The EMS said she wouldn’t of made it, the cops and the lifeguards,” he said.
Smith said if the group of girls were further down the beach—Into a “No Fly Zone” for drones—he wouldn’t of been able to rescue them.
Nay calls Smith a true hero but the teen’s father said he is much more.
“He talked to me for like five minutes and called me his guardian angel and thanking me and stuff. It was pretty crazy,” said Smith.
The girl was checked out and sent home with a clean bill of health.
Smith said this is a good reminder for beachgoers to pay attention to the flag warning system before getting into the water.
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