SAN DIEGO – A San Diego based Coast Guardsmen is scheduled to be honored August 6 for saving the life of a young child who nearly drowned in a pool near La Mesa, Calif. July 3.
Petty Officer Matthew Garrison, a Maritime Enforcement Specialist stationed at Maritime Safety and Security Team San Diego was attending an Independence Day gathering when a young child was pulled motionless from the pool.
Petty Officer Garrison’s training kicked in and he started CPR on the child while obtaining assistance of a good Samaritan who delivered rescue breaths to the child.
After two sets of chest compressions and three sets of rescue breaths the child began to breath on his own. Petty Officer Garrison placed the boy in the recovery position and monitored him until local emergency services personnel arrived on scene and relieved Petty Officer Garrison.
“I am extremely proud of Petty Officer Garrison,” said Cmdr. Eric Cooper, the Commanding Officer of MSST San Diego. “Coast Guard members are consistently training to be proficient in all aspects of our job. July 3rd, that proficiency and dedication to duty paid off saving the life of a young child.”
Garrison, a native of San Diego has been stationed at MSST SD for the past year. He joined the Coast Guard Reserve in 2005 and integrated into the active duty Coast Guard because he enjoyed the missions of the service and wanted to do them full time.
MSST San Diego was created under the Maritime Transportation Security Act of 2002 (MTSA) in direct response to the terrorist attacks on September 11, 2001, and is a part of the Department of Homeland Security's layered strategy directed at protecting seaports and waterways.
Eleven MSSTs are strategically positioned throughout the nation and provide waterborne and a shore-side antiterrorism force protection for strategic shipping, high-interest vessels and critical infrastructure. These units are a quick response force capable of rapid worldwide deployment via air, ground or sea transportation in response to changing threat conditions and evolving maritime homeland security mission requirements.
