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'We Just Knew We Had To Save Him' Says College Student About Boy Pulled From Water

HOWELL (CBS DETROIT) - A local college athlete helps the save the life of a young boy.

Twenty-year-old Amber Staudt, a Marygrove volleyball player and swim instructor, had just finished teaching her class at Hidden Creek community pool in Howell when she heard that a 4-year-old was at the bottom of the pool.

She says the boy's aunt found him and pulled the child out -- and Staudt and another instructor performed CPR immediately -- for about two minutes before paramedics arrived.

"When she pulled him out - he was completely blue - from head to toe and I took a pulse quickly and there was no pulse so the other life guard - she began compressions and I did rescue breaths and after four rounds of CPR we were able to bring him back - that's about when the paramedics showed up."

Staudt who has life guard training tells WWJ's Zahra Huber that, "we just knew we had to save him," they went back to basics when they jumped in to help.

"Me and my partner who did CPR we just looked at each other and we were like, 'we're going to save his life,'" said Staudt. "We both knew that we just had to remain calm and that our training would kick in - and we both kind of had a tunnel vision - we were just focused on what we were doing and we couldn't worry about anything else that was going on. As soon as he took his first gasp of air - there was like this huge sigh of life and we knew that he was back with us."

The boy is recovering and is expected to be okay.

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