On a hot August day, two men in two separate parties winding down on Durrance Lake in Saanich were starting to pack up and consider going home when a ruckus arose.
Like most everyone around them, it seemed like things were under control as a trio of men floundered, then found footing and a pool noodle just across the way.
“All of a sudden, there was this panic,” recalled Josh Nash, recalling Aug. 10, 2025. That day, he helped save a life.
Nash and Alex Boog were recognized for the heroic event with a Silver Medal for Bravery from the Lifesaving Society’s BC and Yukon Branch. The organization recognizes extraordinary acts of courage and lifesaving at its annual Commonwealth Honour and Rescue Awards, this year held on March 28 in Vancouver.
“To be involved in a sequence of events that saved someone’s life is pretty special,” Nash told the Saanich News.
Sitting on the dock with his family, looking over a packed lake, they were enjoying the hubbub of diverse crowds of people chilling as evening approached.
“All of a sudden, there was this panic,” he recounted. It seemed a couple of people had gotten caught up in the dramatic underwater shelf that gives way to water not far from shore.
One minute, the men were happy and splashing, then two were in trouble.
One man got a noodle and recovered his footing, and it seemed momentarily all was going to be OK.
But Nash’s wife, a fluent Hindi speaker, heard someone say Sonu is still missing.
With a nudge from his mom, Nash dove back in the water, pushing off the dock to dash across to where he anticipated the man would be – that drop-off.
He dove deep into the murky water and saw nothing.
A voice in his head said he needed to go deeper – Nash figures he hit 10 to 12 feet the second time.
Bare-eyed and squinting into the dimness along the underwater shelf, he spotted something orange, made out the silhouette of a body and slid his arms under the man’s, planted his feet and pushed off hard.
Someone with a paddleboard was waiting as they broke the surface, and the pair got the man aboard.
Along the same timeframe, Boog, too, was hanging out with friends on a log just beyond the dock when he heard the racket.
When it became clear the concern wasn’t over, the trained lifeguard sprinted across the water toward the commotion.
He was impressed that Nash found the man.
“It’s difficult to see pretty much anything once you’re a couple feet down,” Boog said.
A lifeguard at Commonwealth since late 2021, his training kicked in. Boog was more than ready for the handoff.
He and a couple of others pulled the man to a flat space on shore, where he immediately did an assessment that turned into CPR.
It was his first time performing the life-saving skill on a real human instead of a training dummy.
“Having someone’s life in your hands is significantly different,” he said.
For Nash, the skill was among the specific details that culminated in saving the man: His wife’s understanding of the language, his mom giving a nudge, his experience diving to allow him to get that deep, and the lady with the paddleboard.
Then the lifeguard was ready to take over.
“He knew what to do, and he wasn’t willing to give up,” Nash said.
Boog and another bystander performed what became five or six rounds of CPR before the man coughed up water.
He regained consciousness as the sirens echoed from Willis Point Road, to Ross Durrance Road and finally to the parking lot adjacent to the beach. The man was transferred into the care of paramedics in stable condition.
“I was just happy that we walked away from that day not having anything to trouble me going forward,” said Boog, whose future aspirations include firefighting.
The Lifesaving Society works to reduce water-related incidents through training, public education and advocacy.
That’s what stood out for Nash during the awards event. And part of what both men hope people take away from the story of Durrance Lake.
“Working in aquatics, it just shows how important it is to be responsible about water,” Boog said.
On a larger scale, Nash looks to the current state of frustration and xenophobia over newcomers to Canada.
The four men were non-English-speaking people of colour. Neither of those things mattered.
“It’s just people helping random strangers,” Nash said, noting several people prioritized another human that day.
“It’s someone’s life that should always be valued, and that’s who we are as Canadians.”