POLICE officers are warning parents to alert their children about the dangers of playing near water, following an incident on Good Friday in which a child nearly drowned.

PCs Kevin Smith and Paul Gibson were called out on a 999 call at about 3.30pm on Good Friday from a man whose home overlooks the Moss Nook Fisheries. He had called the control room to say he thought a little girl had fallen in the lake.

PC Smith, explained: "The caller who phoned us played a vital part in a life and death situation. He had seen a little girl playing with a dog at the side of a lake from his bedroom window. He went away for a few minutes and when he returned the dog was still there, but the little girl had vanished. Fortunately he decided to phone the police even though he didn't know for sure if the child had gone into the lake."

He continued: "We arrived at the lake a couple of minutes after the call and we couldn't see any sign of a child in the lake. Then we spotted her clothes and headed towards them, when we reached the pile of clothes we still couldn't see her so we decided to make our way around the lake.

"Luckily we managed to spot the child submerged about 20 yards away from the bank. Instinct took over and we dived in immediately, we pulled her out from the water and managed to get her back to the edge of the lake, where Barry Moyers (the secretary of Moss Nook Fishing Club) took the girl from us."

Once the child - who has been named as three-year-old Shebrice Lee who lives nearby in Parr - was out of the lake the officers checked her for all vital signs of life, but there was no pulse or heartbeat.

PC Gibson, said: "There were just no signs of life at all, but I wasn't going to give up. I started mouth-to-mouth resuscitation and Barry Moyers performed heart massage, in all we worked on her for about eight minutes to get a faint pulse just as the ambulance was arriving."

PC Gibson travelled to Whiston Hospital in the ambulance with Shebrice and when she arrived at the hospital staff immediately set about raising her body temperature, which had fallen dramatically, back to normal. Several hours later Shebrice was transferred to the intensive care unit at Alder Hey Childrens' Hospital, where she is now making a good recovery.

Both the officers have children of their own and say that they can't describe the emotions they have been through since the rescue, but they insist that all emotions are pushed to the side in situations like this and training and instinct takes over. PC Gibson explained: "At times like this you can't afford to be emotional, every second counts.

It is expected that both officers and Barry Moyers will be highly commended for their life-saving roles.

And both officers would like to thank the gentleman who made the emergency call and Barry Moyers without whom the situation would have proved fatal.@@

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