A man who nearly drowned when his canoe capsized at Grindstone Lake in Ruidoso plans to meet the two people who saved his life during a beautiful day that nearly turned tragic.
“I want to [tell] them ‘thank you’ for everything they did for me and my sister,” Johnny Salas told KOB 4 about Cannon Irons and Jordan Wright, two good Samaritans who happened to be in the right place at the right time.
Salas and his sister Darlene grew up going to the lake and were canoeing when they encountered a water spout moving quickly in their direction.
“It was too hard to hold [the canoe], and it picked us up about two or three feet and then tossed us,” Johnny told KOB 4.
While Darlene safely floated in her life jacket, Johnny lost his energy swimming, trying to avoid a second spout. When he wasn’t successful, he conceded the worst.
“I couldn’t hold on no more,” he told KOB 4. “I couldn’t swim no more; I was already so tired so I ended up just accepting it because I couldn’t swim and I started going down.”
Johnny then relayed what he thought were his last words to his sister.
“I just told her, ‘I’m sorry, I love you and mom and dad,” he said. “Right before I accepted death, I told God, please, please just take me to heaven.”
Apparently, it wasn’t his time. That’s when Irons and Wright came to the rescue, according to KOB 4. The two were out on the lake paddle boarding with their girlfriends when the water spout passed over them and swept them all off their boards except for Cannon, who saw Johnny Salas in distress. Cannon paddled to Johnny and Darlene while Jordan swam and arrived first, according to KOB 4.
“When he got to Johnny, Johnny was unconscious, face down in the water,” Irons told KOB 4. “Jordan grabbed him and swam him to my board, and we both drug him up onto my board. Jordan steadied the board from in the water, and I steadied it with my right arm, and I gave him chest compressions with my left.”
Irons had never taken any formal training on CPR, but it worked. “It’s pretty unrealistic how it actually went down,” he said. “I just kind of filed through my memory and remembered movies and seeing people drown and I just kind of went off that to be honest.”
Salas spent three days in the hospital and is happy to be alive.