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Fisherman’s 911 call sparks ocean rescue

Woman’s condition unknown; investigation continues in Rehoboth
December 2, 2016

Maryland resident Bryan Boebel hit the beach early, just before sunrise, the day before Thanksgiving. He was hoping to catch some rockfish that might be lingering in the surf.

Bundled up in a Carhartt jacket and overalls on top of jeans and a shirt, the 40-year-old cable company engineer sat on a cooler beside his fishing rods, watching the sun rise and enjoying his alone time during a trip to Rehoboth Beach to visit family for the holiday.

“It was just a normal morning fishing,” the father of two said. “Then, as I'm watching the rods, I look out, and I'm like, 'What is that floating out there?'”

At first, he suspected it was driftwood or maybe a log.

“As I'm looking out at the ocean, from left to right, it was two things sticking up on the left and two things sticking up on the right, and it was kind of bobbing, floating. Then I'd see something come up in between the two that was really bulkier,” he said.

Suddenly, Boebel realized he was looking at a body.

He called down the beach to a man walking his dog, to see if he would reach the same conclusion. He did.

Boebel kept his eye on the body as he dialed 911.

“If you had the tape of my call, you could hear me screaming,” Boebel said. “At that point, I thought I saw the head come up and the feet go down. So at that point, I'm yelling out to her.”

It was just after 7 a.m. when Rehoboth Beach Police Department and Rehoboth Beach Volunteer Fire Company responded to Boebel’s call, arriving on the southern end of the beach near Stockley and Norfolk streets. Using binoculars, they caught sight of the object and confirmed it was a person.

Emergency responders at first thought they were dealing with a dead body.

“Meanwhile, while all of this is going on, I’m thinking to myself, what if this person is alive, and we’re just standing here watching them die?” Boebel said.

Boebel said he saw the body moving as he waited for police, but it took some time before responders, who were following the body as it floated south, also detected movement.

“At one point, it was bobbing up and down so it looked like it was lifting its head,” Boebel said. “The body was completely laid out and high enough in the water that you could see the feet, a little bit of the knees, and the arms were crossed in the position you would see somebody laid out in a casket.”

There was no response to Boebel's shouts of “Can you hear me?” or yelling from rescuers along the shoreline. But the body was 50 to 100 yards offshore, too far for anyone on the beach to swim out and save her.

“It was so far, I couldn’t cast my line out there,” Boebel said. “It's still in my mind that I didn't do everything that I think I could have for this person. The thought crossed my mind many times if I should swim out there.”

While emergency crews waited for a rescue boat, the current carried the body south to Dewey Beach, where a Lewes Fire Department rescue boat reached the woman. A trained rescuer jumped into the 50-degree ocean and pulled the fully clothed woman out of the water. She was treated by EMS and taken to Beebe Healthcare in serious condition.

“By the time she was picked up, she was two to three blocks from hitting the dead zone of the beaches,” Boebel said, referring to the long stretch of beach between Dewey and the Indian River Inlet. “If she wouldn't have been noticed in that section of Dewey, we wouldn't be having this conversation.”

Police later identified the woman as Millsboro resident Stacia Matson, 50. An investigation is ongoing, but no foul play is suspected. Police have not explained why Matson was in the water, and other rescuers said no boats were found nearby.

“It's still kind of a surreal thing,” Boebel said, adding that he received many phone calls during the holiday when word got out that he had made the call that likely saved a stranger's life. “I am still anxious to find out if she's still alive.”

A Rehoboth Beach Police Department spokesman said he had no information on whether Matson was still in the hospital. Beebe Healthcare also declined to update her condition.

“We don't keep information or have information about who is or isn't a patient at Beebe,” said Beebe spokeswoman Kelly Griffin. “I don't have any information to share.”

While Matson's condition and why she was in the water remain unknown, first responders say the rescue was highly unusual.

“She was out in the middle of the water with no boat, no floatation. That's not very common,” said U.S. Coast Guard Operations Officer Tyler Pickrell. “It was a pretty baffling case.”

Lewes Fire Department spokesman Glenn Marshall agreed.

“The majority of these kind of calls are during the summer season,” he said. “We get a good mix between boating and swimmers in distress, or what people consider to be swimmers or paddleboarders in distress.”

Marshall encourages people to call if they suspect someone may be in trouble while on the water.

“We'd rather go to something that turns out to be nothing rather than someone not call because they're not sure,” he said. “Let us do what we're here to do.”

Marshall said stakes are higher in the fall and winter when fewer people are on the beach, and water temperatures drop.

“It's truly more time-sensitive in the winter,” he said. “Once you're wet, you're wet, and you start losing body temperature, making it difficult to move extremities. Once that starts happening, panic can kick in.”

When Matson was pulled from the water, wearing boots and boating-style clothing, rescuers quickly dried her off and tried to warm her up. She had spent at least an hour in chilly ocean waters and was at risk of hypothermia. She was conscious, but mostly unresponsive and quiet as the boat sped back to Lewes to meet EMS on the dock on Pilottown Road, rescuers said.

“It's still kind of a surreal thing,” Boebel said, adding that every time he returned to the beach during the holiday weekend, he couldn't help but scan the water, wondering what might be out there.

“That's not really something that happens to everybody every day,” he said. “I don't feel heroic about it. It's just something I did. I just made a phone call.”

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