A California woman plunged into turbulent ocean water and kept an unconscious surfer’s head above the surface after a powerful wave hurled him into rocks along the San Diego County coastline.
Benita Karo, 39, was walking near the beach in Oceanside on the morning of Sept. 26 when she paused to watch unusually large waves battering the shore.
Karo, who lives in nearby Carlsbad, told the California Post that she had stopped for coffee and was thinking about her daughter’s 14th birthday celebration later that day. She took out her phone to film the heavy surf.
Karo told the Post that she works as a celebrity publicist for authors who write books about Elvis Presley.
While recording, she noticed a surfer carrying his board and attempting to leave the water. A massive wave was building behind him, but he appeared unaware of the danger.
“I see the wave. He doesn’t see it. It’s massive, and it just hits him, and he didn’t even see it coming,” Karo told the Post.
The wave slammed the surfer into the rocks. Karo ran toward the water, looking for any sign that he would rise back to the surface.
He never did.
“When I got closer, I saw him upside down, face down in the water, not awake at all. Like he was knocked out,” Karo said.
Without removing her clothes, Karo entered the churning water and seized the surfer, raising his head above the surface as waves continued pounding them against the rocks and seawall.
“I sat there with him, holding him, just trying to keep his head above water,” she said.
Another surfer eventually saw the pair, while people at a nearby beach house hurried to the shoreline to assist. Working together, they pulled the injured man from the water and moved him onto the beach.
Emergency responders arrived soon afterward. They cut away part of the surfer’s wetsuit, placed him on a gurney and transported him from the scene.
Karo said the man appeared to be trying to breathe, and she saw water coming from his mouth.
“He was definitely breathing,” Karo said.
Karo was also hurt during the rescue. She told the California Post that she suffered scratches and injuries to her toe, face and back while making her way through the rocky water.
The incident also drew on experience from Karo’s first job: She had worked as a lifeguard at age 15.
At the time, she was employed at a water park with a wave pool, where the waves could be turned off in an emergency. The open ocean presented a far more dangerous challenge.
“At the ocean, you just can’t turn off the waves; they just keep coming,” she said.
The dramatic Oceanside rescue unfolded as millions of people along Mexico’s Pacific Coast prepared for the arrival of a powerful storm.
A powerful Category 3 hurricane is zeroing in on Baja California, warning of life-threatening flash floods, flattening winds and massive surf as it barrels toward landfall in the coming hours.
Hurricane Polo, packing sustained winds near 115 mph, is forecast to slam into the west coast of Baja California Sur late this afternoon or evening, per the National Hurricane Center.
