Flare rescue remembered 41 years on
15/06/2023
A woman who was rescued from the water with the aid of a flare warning 41 years ago, has been reunited with her rescuer.
Memory Wilks, of Texas, USA, was rescued by Doug Ritter, after her family’s speedboat sank off Ponce Inlet, New Smyrna Beach, when she was aged eight in May 1982.
Upon seeing him again, she said, “I’ll never forget him. I can’t thank him enough. He’s truly my hero,” reported 7 News Miami.
The family’s 17-foot speed boat with four adults and four children aboard started sinking. There were jellyfish around and the family was terrified.
But a flare warning was fired and seen by Mr Riiter, who rescued them using his 35-foot army surplus LARC, a land and sea vessel used in Vietnam.
