Crime & Safety

Lakewood Man Saves 11-year-old Boy From Drowning in Apartment Pool

Witnesses say Ron Onufer screamed, "Don't die on me," as he pulled the boy from the Forrest Village Apartment pool Tuesday afternoon.

Ron Onufer now calls it the longest minute of his life.

"He was limp," Onufer said of the 11-year-old boy he pulled from an apartment swimming pool Tuesday afternoon. "He was not breathing. There was no pulse, no heart beat or anything."

Emergency workers credit the 53-year-old's fast reaction as a chief reason the boy is alive today following the  2:45 p.m. accident.

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"Not everybody would be able to do what he did," said Jenny Sharp, assistant fire marshall for West Pierce Fire & Rescue. "It's efforts like that, there was no relation to this boy, just somebody at the same time, he saved a boy's life. He did a great job. He did what we encourage people to do but not always able to in these types of situations."

Two hours after the incident, Onufer was still shaking as he described his afternoon leading up to the effort:

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He had been on a two-hour break from work. The good weather had prompted him to ride his 10-speed. While on break, he rode a short distance to his apartment's swimming pool to take a short dip.

Two boys were playing catch with a ball while Onufer was drying off in the shade at the Forest Village apartment complex swimming pool. After a little while, Onufer was nudged by one of the boys, who asked him why the other boy was joking around underwater in the deep end.

Onufer ran over to the pool.  He looked at the boy floating for about 10 seconds, he said. The boy, fully dressed in jeans and a long-sleeve shirt, had sunk toward the bottom of the pool. 

He dove in and pulled the boy from the water while a bystander called 911.

He put the boy on the ground. A woman  who rushed over told Onufer there was no pulse. He started CPR.

"When I pulled that kid up, I'm thinking he might die in front of me," Onufer said. "I thought this kid was not going to make it, but I said to myself, 'I'm not going to give up.' "

Then it happened.

"I got him breathing," Onufer exclaimed.

The boy threw up water and food, he said. Then his eyes went wide open and the boy began to panick. Lakewood Police were the first to respond, as West Pierce paramedics transported the boy to Mary Bridge Children's Hospital for medical evaluation.

Christy Onufer, Onufer's daughter, said her father is a really good swimmer.

"I think that's pretty awesome," Christy Onufer said about her father. "I'm really proud of him."

Onufer's younger brother, Graham Onufer,  heard part of the accident because Ron was talking to him on the phone before saving the boy. He heard part of the situation over the phone while in Mission Viejo, a city in Southern California.

"He was at the right place at the right time," Graham Onufer said. "It was a good thing he knew what to do."


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