There are truly some unselfish people in this world!

[Hover Fly]

Life saving advice is, I seem to remember:

Don't get in the water if there's any alternative. Use ropes, lifebelts, long sticks to reach out to a drowning person.

If they can't help themselves (such as in the case above), and you must enter the water, then don't dive. Preferably, don't even jump, but wade, or lower yourself in off the bank. You can't tell what's under the water, and if you go in suddenly, then the shock of cold water (and water can be very cold, even on a hot day) can cause even strong swimmers to drown, as the reflex action is to gasp, and possibly inhale water.

A few years ago I was walking besides Ulverston canal on a hot Sunday I got to the sea end, where there was a bit of commotion, a little girl had fallen in, across the way from a pub, at a quick estimate more of the young men who frequent these places than not had stripped to the waist and jumped in to swim across the canal, despite it being quicker to run over the bridge, but before any of the youths had reached the girl her father had stepped in, the water was about waist deep, and pulled her out. Why did so many lads jump in? Perhaps it was a chance to impress the ladies.

It's a long time since I had an interest in the RoSPA figures for drowning deaths, but in 2005 more people drowned because they could swim than because they couldn't (42 to 16 from memory) and of the swimmers approximately half had gone in to save someone or something i.e. a dog.

 

[Arch]

Why did so many lads jump in? Perhaps it was a chance to impress the ladies.
.

Perhaps, but also I suspect sheer unthinkingness. Unless you're trained, or just very naturally level headed, it can be very hard to think properly in a situation you think is an emergency (indeed, even assessing the level of emergency is a difficult thing to do). The natural tendency of most people is probably to either leap in, or to hang back, afraid, unable to 'help' at all.

I know that I know a lot of the right things to do in situations, but I also know that despite that, I tend to panic.

 

[ColinJ]

I know that I know a lot of the right things to do in situations, but I also know that despite that, I tend to panic.

"Don't panic!"

Simple advice to give, but not necessarily to take ...

My sister managed to set fire to a frying pan once - I think she was probably trying to deep fry in it! We were in our teens at the time. I freaked out, picked up the burning pan and ran to the kitchen door with it, intending to throw it outside. Two problems:

1. I'd got hold of the pan by the pan itself, rather than by the handle!
2. When my sister opened the door, a gust of wind caught the flames and blew them back towards me!

The result was that I dropped the pan on the doorstep and almost set fire to the door. Fortunately, somebody then remembered that we should be smothering the flames with damp cloths ...

(Somehow, I escaped with only slightly charred fingertips!)

 

[slowmotion]

I saved somebody's life once. I gave a 700 x 23C tube to a roadie walking his bike in Sloane Square at 9:30 on Monday night.
How long does it take for them to post a George Medal citation letter?

 

[SatNavSaysStraightOn]

Perhaps, but also I suspect sheer unthinkingness. Unless you're trained, or just very naturally level headed, it can be very hard to think properly in a situation you think is an emergency (indeed, even assessing the level of emergency is a difficult thing to do). The natural tendency of most people is probably to either leap in, or to hang back, afraid, unable to 'help' at all.

I know that I know a lot of the right things to do in situations, but I also know that despite that, I tend to panic.

one of the unforseen side effects of one of my major medication conditions (Addisson's disease) is that I don't panic. Ironically it is probably what saved me from bleeding to death at the side of the road (severed major artery & punctured major vein) in Turkey because my OH who had also been bitten was completely at a loss as to what to so and wanted to do so much at once that he was getting nothing done whatsoever and I had to give him verbal commands and instructions to get stuff from the bike to look after me.
It also has a down side because when something big went wrong at work, I was expected to get harrassed or at least look like it was a mjor problem, but instead I would just act normally and not worry about it, which irrates the senior staff considerably because they expect IT to run around like headless chickens when something major goes wrong rather than sit there calmly and make a coffee to buy thinking time!

 

[ufkacbln]

i've been bought up right in that my mum was verily involved in charity work and was the kind of person who couldnt/wouldnt turn away from anything so would think that i wouldnt hesitate to help.

I remember my mum coming across 3 blokes laying into a bloke on the floor, she swung the car around and drove at the blokes who where assaulting him, got out and bundled the man on the floor into the car to get him out of there.

i am/was also always avaliable for lifts as i dont trust taxis and when people try and give me money i sneak it back to them in some form.

Couple of years ago, we were cycling through Glasgow, and out by Govan

Two lads were laying into another, but we didn't have to do anything..... This little old lady, about 5' tall, in her eighties came out of a shop and laid into the two lads verbally. ( have no idea what she actually said, as much of it was dialect)


They stopped, looked at her sheepishly and ran away - I often wonder who she was, or who she knew that had such an effect. In Portsmouth she would have been at least verbally abused

 

[Twilkes]

I was walking, looking for a hotel once, and stopped to ask a woman outside her house where it was. She indicated the direction and asked if I was walking, I said yes, but it's fine because the wedding's not until 3pm. She offered to drive me so I got in.

She was talking about the venue and saying she'd been there, but not for a wedding and it was very nice. She asked whose wedding it was, and when I said it was mine she let out a huge Irish squeal and couldn't concentrate on the road.

On the same day, my then-not-wife's taxi was early picking her up, and they were going to arrive at the venue way too early. They were going to circle for a bit, but the driver asked if she minded him going to the car wash. She said not at all. I found out this on the day. A year later, I found out it was a handwash, so there were half a dozen guys scrubbing away while she was in the taxi in her wedding dress.

 

[Andrew_Culture]

I'm eerily calm in emmergencies, I've called ambulances and given emergency aid several times.

One time a female friend was stone cold unconscious and while on the phone to the emergency services I was trying to clear her airways. Something was stuck and try as I might I just couldn't pull it out. I'd forgotten that she'd had a tongue stud fitted the day before....

 

[Puddles]

I found these and was quite touched by them

There’s no denying that the world is full of cruel, evil people capable of things you probably couldn’t even imagine. We see it on the news pretty much every day. But believe it or not, there’s a lot more good and kindness out there than you probably realize. Sometimes, people do incredible things – things that restore our faith in humanity

When some kids left this note to track down the owner of a forgotten skateboard that they could’ve easily stolen.

18. When this girl stopped what she was doing to give shelter to a disabled man in the rain.

I was very grateful and a little surprised, when I got the train with the 2 small people on Saturday (I had previously done the journey with one on the train) some of the gaps between train and station are quite large where we change trains, to me they are a little panic inducing especially in the wet and with unsteady little feet.

No one pushed or was impatient, at the doors, all waited for me to get on I was waiting patiently in the queue at the door but everyone moved and gestured for me to get on first with the small people .Some even handed shopping bags so I had hands free to put small people on and not turn round and get off again to get the bags.. Getting off the train I experienced the same a lovely man took all our bags off the train so I was free to get the little ones off the train on to the platform.

It was a little gesture but it helped so much and made it all less manic for me.

 

[Andrew_Culture]

The world is like ones face when we were teens, if we can see past the oil and the spots there's beauty desperate to reveal itself.

 

[Accy cyclist]

I don't think anybody would fancy diving in to save these unfortunates. http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2486044/UK-weather-Woman-drowns-swept-tiny-cave.html The attempted rescuers deserve a medal for trying to save someone who died doing a very foolish thing.

 

[Fnaar]

I like to help people out when I can... buggy-lifting, door-opening, etc... and I like to think I'd do what I could in an emergency. And I also like to think I'd do what this bus-driver did...made me blub a bit, this did...

 

[asterix]

I saved somebody's life once. I gave a 700 x 23C tube to a roadie walking his bike in Sloane Square at 9:30 on Monday night.
How long does it take for them to post a George Medal citation letter?

D'you think a 700x23c tube would have kept him afloat? I reckon a 28 would have been better.