Heroes: Rescue in the Water
Mike McClure waded into Sarasota Bay for a little fishing on a beautiful day last April. The 67-year-old retired youth counselor had been angling in Florida’s intracoastal waters for years. This afternoon, the water off the New College of Florida campus was shallow enough at low tide that McClure could easily walk 100 yards offshore and cast his line in any direction. Sporting waders that reached up to his chest, he worked his way south down a sandbar, searching for his first nibble of the day.
“I was just enjoying the heck out of the experience,” says McClure.
Near sunset, still without a fish, he decided to turn back. Rather than retrace his earlier course, though, he chose a more direct path toward shore, assuming the bay wouldn’t get deeper along the way. Instead, it had become an impassable trough, and he was trapped. “When I turned around and realized that the water was getting close to my waist, I just felt so alone,” he remembers. He tried to wade along different angles, but shallower water eluded him. Finally, he decided his safest option was to head straight for land and hope for the best.
“Within about five steps, the water was coming in through the top of the waders,” says McClure.
From left: Loren Niurka Mora, Caitlin Petro, and Eliza Cameron at Sarasota Bay
