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San Jose: Teacher recounts resuscitating girl who nearly drowned in pool

By Mark Gomez mgomez@mercurynews.com
Posted: 07/28/2011 11:30:34 AM PDT
Updated: 07/28/2011 01:16:26 PM PDT

It's been a few years since Lynbrook High School teacher Jeff Bale has undergone CPR training. Wednesday night, the 29-year-old social studies teacher relied on that training to resuscitate a 6-year-old girl who moments earlier had been pulled out of the deepest part of a swimming pool.

"I was certainly nervous," Bale said. "When it's a real person, it's different than a test dummy."

Bale is one of a group of people who sprang into action Thursday night after a 40-year-old father and his 6-year-old daughter were found at the bottom of the 8-¿1/2-foot pool at the Regency Park townhome complex, off Miller Avenue near Vallco Shopping Mall.

The man and girl were pulled out of the pool by a family friend whose identity has not yet been released by the San Jose Fire Department. Fire officials have credited the family friend with saving the lives of the dad and daughter, who were both out of the hospital by early Thursday afternoon.

As of this morning, the father has been released from the hospital and the little girl was doing well but still hospitalized for observation, according to San Jose Fire Capt. Mary Gutierrez.

Gutierrez said the man who pulled out the father and daughter is declining all requests for interviews.
"He's humble and is not comfortable talking to the press," Gutierrez said. "He's happy that his friends are out of the hospital and are safe and sound."

The father and daughter are also declining interview requests.

Sometime around 9 p.m. Wednesday night, Linda Bale was home in her kitchen, which overlooks the swimming pool area, when she heard a cry for help. Her first thought was that kids were playing around. But then Bale saw the a woman -- the girl's mother -- screaming for help. Bale called out for her son Jeff.

As Linda Bale dialed 911, her son jumped over a metal fence surrounding the pool area and ran to the girl, who was lying on the concrete, unconscious and not breathing. He also saw the family friend trying to pull out the girl's father from the deepest part of the pool.

"It was pretty clear she wasn't breathing," Jeff Bale said. "Her mom was already trying to do some impromptu CPR. She kept yelling, 'I don't know how to do CPR.' "

Bale resuscitated the girl after about a dozen compressions. She coughed up some water and started making noises, Bale said. Then the girl started crying.

San Jose firefighters say the girl was sitting atop her father's shoulders as he stood in the shallow end of the pool at about 8:55 p.m. The mother and other friends and neighbors in the complex sat some 25 feet away in a hot tub, facing away from the pool.
Then the mother and friends heard an eerie quiet in the pool. The mother and a family friend got out of the hot tub and ran over to the pool to discover two bodies the bottom of the pool, according to fire department officials.

The friend immediately jumped into the water and pulled both the unconscious girl and her father from the pool. Other people in the area had revived the man by giving him CPR, firefighters said.

"The man was in shock," Jeff Bale said. "We got towels and tried to get him warm. He had a very glassy look."
Jeff Bale deflected credit for his role in saving the girl, saying the family friend who dove into the water deserves the credit, as well as the first-responders who arrived to help.

"This was a community effort," said Bale, adding that the incident has "encouraged me to get a refresher course," in CPR training.
Staff writer Mike Rosenberg contributed to this report. Contact Mark Gomez at 408-920-5869.