Off-duty California firefighters save Bay Area man from near-drowning in Lake Tahoe

The Bay Area man was submerged and unconscious before three Good Samaritans performed CPR.|
ASSOCIATED PRESS
BY ASSOCIATED PRESS

ENO, Nev. - A Nevada sheriff say a near-drowning victim at Lake Tahoe is alive thanks to the "extraordinary efforts" of two off-duty firefighters from California and a physician's assistant from Iowa who pitched in to help save his life.

Washoe County Sheriff Darin Balaam singled out the three "Good Samaritans" and other deputies Friday, a week after the emergency was reported on Tahoe's east shore.

The trio included Erin Dohlman, a recent graduate from the Des Moines University Physician Assistant Program, and Freddy Matias, an off-duty firefighter from Cal Fire's Napa Valley station.

Balaam says the other unnamed firefighter was administering CPR to a San Francisco Bay Area man who was submerged and unconscious before Dohlman and Matias joined in.

He says they happened to be the right people, "with the right skills, in the right place, at the right time."

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