FireLink

News >> Browse Articles >> Op / Ed

First Responders Share Special Bond With Rescued Girl and Mother

PACIFIC BEACH – Nearly five years ago, paramedic Annie O’Connell and her fellow firefighters made a special connection with a little girl they treated after she was found unconscious in a neighbor’s hot tub in Pacific Beach.

“We were all devastated. These calls break your heart,” O’Connell said. “You know you did the best you could, but there’s a dark cloud that hangs over everyone.”

Four-year-old Ciara Gray had a faint pulse when emergency personnel got her to Rady Children’s Hospital, but no one knew how long she had been under water, and the outlook was grim.

About 12 days after the 911 call, the firefighters who responded happened to be buying groceries at a nearby Henry’s market. O’Connell was in for a huge surprise – a warm greeting and hug from Ciara’s mother, Kathy Miller. She was shopping because Ciara had just been released from the hospital.

Ciara had been in the hospital for eight days, some of the time in an induced coma.

Miller thanked O’Connell for stabilizing her daughter, who had turned blue and was having seizures before going to the hospital.

The firefighters invited Ciara and her family to dine with them that evening at their station at the foot of Grand Avenue. It was the girl’s first outing and the beginning of a friendship between the family and the firefighters.

Ciara and her two younger siblings have visited the fire station many times since. Miller stops by on her morning jogs and has invited O’Connell to dinner.

Last month, a grinning Ciara, now 9 and showing little evidence of her ordeal, was the flower girl at O’Connell’s wedding to Mira Mesa firefighter Steve Bixler.

Her mother was delighted: “The relationship that develops between someone saved and the person saving them is very special.”

---