Junior lifeguards receive Bravo for Bravery awards

Three Huntington Beach Junior Lifeguards have won an award for team heroism from the American Red Cross.

Paige Bisson, Carley Zylstra and Kylie Cocinotti won the Team Award at the organization’s Bravo For Bravery awards Wednesday. All three managed to save the life of Paige’s sister Devyn Bisson, whose neck broke in a freak accident while surfing. The teens protected Devyn’s spinal cord in a “C-spine” hold they had learned in class just the day before, and they swam her in for help.

Also receiving a nomination, if not the awards, were a Fountain Valley resident and a Huntington Beach resident, who rescued a woman whose car plunged into the waters of the Bolsa Chica wetlands.

Matt Levesque, a Los Angeles County Firefighter from Fountain Valley, and Conor Gorey of Huntington Beach dove into the water Oct. 27 to save a woman who was trapped inside her Toyota Camry underwater, according to Huntington Beach fire officials, who nominated the men for the award.

“By the time Huntington Engine 46 got there, these guys had done all the hard work,” said Huntington Beach Fire Captain Michael Tamisyahu. “[The woman] said that if those guys hadn’t got her out, she would have drowned.”

— Michael Alexander