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A California college student rescued three girls who were in danger of drowning at a Seattle park after spotting them struggling in the water during a festival.
The student, Lillie Vehling, is a Division I water polo player at the University of California, Davis, FOX 13 Seattle reported.
Vehling was in Seattle for Seafair, the city’s annual summer festival, when she spotted three girls struggling in the waters of Lake Washington near Genesee Park on July 31.
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A California native, Vehling had gone to Genesee Park to watch the U.S. Navy Blue Angels flight demonstration squadron.
The girls “did not look very good” in the water, Vehling said in an interview with FOX 13 Seattle.
“They were already bobbing up and down, trying to get breaths, and one of the girls was actually drowning the others in order to breathe,” she said.
“That’s when I knew I had to jump in.”
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Vehling said that she saved the girl who was drowning the others first “so that the others weren’t even in worse shape.”
Fox News Digitial reached out to Vehling for more details.
“I removed them one by one.”
“I removed them one by one,” she told FOX 13. “The first girl — I, again, don’t really remember how I did it, but I got her back to the shallow water.”
After rescuing the second swimmer, Vehling untangled the third girl from the buoy rope and brought her up to safety.
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“Unfortunately, by the time I had gotten to the third girl, it was just the top of her head that was there,” Vehling said.
“I just saw her black hair in the water barely floating and when I got to her, she was unconscious. I lifted her head up out of the water and had my arm underneath her armpit holding her up,” she added.
The girl coughed up water and regained consciousness, according to FOX 13.
Seafair later honored Vehling for the rescue, inviting her to its gala — where she was knighted and named Seafair royalty.
She was also given a special opportunity to see the U.S. Navy Blue Angels, a squadron she has long admired.
Fox News Digital reached out to Seafair for comment.
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Drowning is the leading cause of death among children ages 1 to 4 and the second-leading cause of unintentional injury death among children ages 5 to 14, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC).
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Similar rescues have made recent headlines across the country.
Earlier this summer, two Florida lifeguards were credited with saving a 5-year-old boy who was pulled unconscious from the ocean at Silver Beach after his frantic family flagged them down for help.
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In LA County, lifeguards performed nearly 2,000 ocean rescues over a single weekend amid extreme heat and dangerous surf conditions.
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