A handful of Marines’ swimming skills were put to the test recently during incidents that required lifesaving measures for those involved.
On Oct. 12, personnel with Marine Medium Tiltrotor Squadron 262, 31st Marine Expeditionary Unit, were snorkeling around Cape Zanpa, an advanced dive spot with steep cliffs, crevices and rocky shorelines on Okinawa, Japan, according to a release.
As the Marines started packing up for the day, Lance Cpl. Jared Beachy, a flight line mechanic from New Braunfels, Texas, looked over the cliff’s edge and saw a couple swimming below.
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With the sun setting and waves intensifying, Beachy turned to leave with his group when he and the other Marines heard shouting.
“It didn’t sound right,” said Cpl. Robert Escamilla, a UH-1Y Venom helicopter crew chief from Houston, Texas. “Something sounded weird. You can usually tell when something is a little off in a situation, and that kind of triggered something in our heads into doing a little more investigation before we left.”
The group rushed to the cliff’s edge and saw a man standing alone without the woman he’d been swimming with moments earlier. But the Marines couldn’t spot the woman from land.
So, three of them jumped in.
“We were all super tired and drained at this point because we had been swimming for about four hours already,” said Cpl. Joshua Stevens, a native of Nazareth, Pennsylvania, and a UH-1Y Venom helicopter crew chief. “But the adrenaline kicked in and it was a matter of it being a real serious situation. I didn’t know if I would be recovering a body or looking for someone who was banged up and we wouldn’t be able to carry her back.”
About 100 yards from the shore, Beachy found the woman in distress. She’d been carried away by the current and was being tossed by powerful waves into the rocky shoreline.
He swam toward her and began to assess her injuries.
“Her knee was hurting and she had light bruises and scratches, but the biggest thing was that she was in shock and couldn’t stand up on her own,” Beachy said.
Beachy and Stevens carried the woman to safety. Meanwhile, Michigan native Cpl. Theron Dubay, a helicopter airframe mechanic, gathered up everyone’s gear and swam ahead of the trio to guide the rescuers to safety.
On Nov. 6, three of the Marines who participated in the rescue received the Navy and Marine Corps Commendation Medal.
The Okinawa-based Marines, meanwhile, were not the only personnel to recently have such efforts recognized.
Lance Cpl. Sean Olson was awarded in September for actions that took place a few thousand miles away and approximately a year earlier than those of his fellow Marines on Okinawa.
On June 16, 2023, Olson made his way to China Walls, a well-known local cliff-jumping spot near Honolulu, Hawaii. The sea was more rough than usual that day, he noticed.
Olson, a former lifeguard with Marine water survival training, had experienced rough water before, but what would happen that day would push the limits of his swimming abilities.
At the popular sea cliff, the administrative clerk with Headquarters and Service Battalion, Marine Corps Forces-Pacific, spotted a young woman “struggling to stay afloat in the rough surf below,” according to the release.
As waves pulsed higher, Olson spotted the woman battling to keep her head above water.
“As soon as I saw her plunge into the water, that’s when I knew it was time to jump in,” Olson said in the release.
Once he hit the water, Olson swam toward the panicking woman as she thrashed in the water. He first worked to calm the woman before beginning the fight against strong currents and crashing waves, eventually guiding the woman back to the base of the cliffs.
With the woman safely back on land, it seemed Olson’s rescue efforts were done. That’s when he spotted a second woman flailing in the water, struggling to stay afloat.
Exhausted, Olson jumped back into the sea, swimming hard toward the woman in distress.
A wave crashed over him, throwing him into the cliffs. He covered his head with his arms as his back scraped across the sharp surface, ripping a deep gash into his flesh.
Despite his injuries, Olson managed to get the second swimmer to safety, according to the release.
For saving two lives, the Marine Corps recognized Olson with the Navy and Marine Corps Commendation Medal and a meritorious promotion to corporal.
Todd South has written about crime, courts, government and the military for multiple publications since 2004 and was named a 2014 Pulitzer finalist for a co-written project on witness intimidation. Todd is a Marine veteran of the Iraq War.
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