Two Italian brothers return to Ireland to thank rescuers after falling 20 metres into the Wormhole on Inis Mor in February 2019.
Ricardo and Giovanni Zanon were visiting the WormHole (Pol na bPheist) on Inis Mor when a wave knocked them into the water.
Speaking on RTE’s Morning Ireland, Ricardo Zanon believed that he would have died after the wave knocked him and he fell 20 metres into the water.
He said: “I just remember a big, huge wave like a grey wall coming towards me and then it was completely dark and I thought I was going to die.”
After falling into the water, Ricardo recalled being dragged around by the waves.
Ricardo said that when he saw Philip Wrenn coming down from the helicopter, he knew that he would be safe: “When I saw him I had the feeling of, this is going to be okay, we’re going to get out of here.”
Ricardo broke his tibia and pelvis and shattered 8cm of bone, which had to be reconstructed.
He said that he was bleeding a lot but believed that the cold February water helped to slow down the bleeding: “Luckily the water was so cold that it sort of stopped the bleeding and slowed it.”
Ricardo spent a month at University Hospital Galway and a week at Tallaght University Hospital before he could return back to his home in Italy.
Philip Wrenn who was the winch-man on board the helicopter that day says that he has carried out many rescues at the Wormhole on the island: “I’ve been a couple of times, at a couple of different incidences.
“One similar to the guys, and another one where someone had injured themselves just walking across the rough area of the rocks.”
He explained on the RTE show the kind of wave that knocked the Zanon brothers into the water: “There is a phenomenon on the west coast there where there’s a bigger than average wave hits every seven or eight waves.
“That’s the one that hit the lads and knocked them off the cliff down into the Wormhole.”
Wrenn pointed out that the rescue was a team effort from the crew of six - captain Colm O’Grady, co-pilot Art Hyland, winch operator Kieran McHugh, and two staff at base, Hugh O’Grady and Liam Hannon.
Wrenn said that it was his training and 12 years of experience that made the rescue successful: “You have to think on the huff.
“You have to make decisions, split-second decisions and that comes from experience.”
