Hero bridegroom rescued drowning girl from pool

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Former Royal Navy diver Todd Sweeney was in Cyprus getting ready to marry Hazel Bowden when he spotted a body on the bottom of the swimming pool.

The teenage girl, understood to be called Sarah, was part of a group from London and is believed to have suffered a seizure and sunk underwater.
Mr Sweeney said he ran from his ground floor room and dived into the pool.

Mr Sweeney, 40, from Falmouth, Cornwall, said the girl had turned blue and stopped breathing and he managed to resuscitate her.

He said: "We were relaxing and getting ready for the wedding when I suddenly noticed a body at the bottom of the pool. I think my training just kicked in automatically. I got her out and did CPR. She'd turned blue and I had to get her breathing."

After resuscitating Sarah he placed her in the recovery position before paramedics arrived to take her to hospital.

Three hours after the dramatic incident, on May 15, Mr Sweeney married his fiancee at a ceremony at Ayia Napa town hall.

He said it was a lovely service with the couple's one-year-old daughter Neala as a flower girl but admitted he was a bit shaken.

He said: "I dried off, had a brief sit down and then went. I was a bit jumpy and shocked about what had happened, but nothing a cold beer didn't sort out afterwards. It was an eventful day."

Mr Sweeney, now a computer engineer, said he saw Sarah two days later and she had made a full recovery.

He said: "It was an amazing feeling to see her up and enjoying her holiday. She had no memory of what had happened."

Mrs Sweeney said she was "immensely proud" of her "heroic" husband.

She said: "It all happened so quickly. He didn't hesitate and just jumped into action. He saw her in the pool and was gone.

"The first thing we did when we got back to the hotel after the wedding was ask how she was, and we were told she was doing well. It was a huge relief."