Sgt. John Strang saves 2 year old from drowing

Iraq vet’s training saves life of tot

By Johnny Edwards - The Augusta (Ga.) Chronicle
Posted : Friday Aug 1, 2008 16:46:21 EDT

AIKEN, S.C. — Looking down into the pool, John Strang was sure the child was dead.

What he did next kept 2-year-old Byron Murray from becoming a tragic newspaper headline.

On July 17, Strang, an Iraq war veteran, used CPR training he learned in the Army to resuscitate his friend’s son, who climbed into a pool behind his house in rural Aiken County. Byron’s father wasn’t home at the time, but he admits that even if he had been there he couldn’t have done what Strang did.

This shows why all parents and caregivers should learn CPR, said Dianne Lariscy, the director of health and safety services for Red Cross of Augusta, Ga.

“It’s absolutely vital,” she said. “We don’t often have time to wait for an ambulance to get there.”

That afternoon, Strang was working in New Holland, where he has been helping his friend Chad Barker take apart an old mobile home on his family’s property that was being salvaged for scrap. Barker, a single father, was at work, and his son Byron and three older children played in the yard. A baby sitter and Byron’s grandmother were inside.

One of the children ran up to Strang.

“Johnny, you need to get Byron. He’s in the pool,” the child said. “He’s drowning.”

Strang said he ran behind the house to an above-ground pool with sides about 5 feet high.

There was no splashing. Strang said at first he thought Byron wasn’t in the pool.

Then he saw him at the bottom, face down, not moving.

“Blue as a Smurf,” Strang said. “Unnatural. I’ve never seen that before.”

He has seen a lot for a 24-year-old, though. Strang, a sergeant in the Army Reserve, served two tours in Iraq, the first during the 2003 invasion with the Augusta-based 319th Transportation Company, the second from 2004 to 2005 when he was attached to the Orangeburg-based 414th Transportation Company.
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http://www.armytimes.com/news/2008/08/ap_childrescued_080108/