Engaged couple Isabella Scott and Ezrick Marines were enjoying the holiday weekend in Boston when a misstep nearly took Marines’ life.
Both Scott and Marines are visually impaired, and Marines has a guide dog named Brutus who helps him navigate the world.
The trio were out at Fan Pier Park one evening, enjoying the Boston Harbor, when Marines and Brutus found their way to a section where there was a gap in the guardrail.
Scott was filming a live TikTok video as Marines stepped off the pier into the open air and fell six feet to the water, pulling Brutus along with him.
She panicked, knowing that her fiance couldn’t swim, and she couldn’t help him. She started screaming for help, and some of her TikTok viewers started calling 911.
“I started shouting ‘he can’t swim, he can’t swim’ because that is the only logical thing I could think of to do at the time,” she told WBZ-TV.
Marines acknowledged that he was in dire straits, flailing around in the water with no chance on his own.
“I can’t swim to save my life,” he explained. “I had a book bag on, I had my phone in my hand, had the dog in my other hand, freaking out.
“Sheer fear and panic.”
In the scramble, Scott paused the video just as help arrived, leaving her viewers in the lurch and not recording the heroic save as two unnamed good Samaritans jumped into the harbor and helped Marines to safety.
Brutus was able to find his way to shore on his own.
An ambulance was soon on the scene, thanks to the viewers and some passersby who also called 911 when they realized what had happened. Marines was ushered to be evaluated, and the couple never got to officially meet their heroes.
If you ask Scott, Marines would be dead if it weren’t for the two who plunged in after him.
“They jumped in themselves to rescue somebody that they didn’t even know,” Scott said. “And that, to me, is heroic.
“It was so hectic that we didn’t get to get their names because we were rushed into the ambulance.”
“I really want to meet them and just like, thank them from the bottom of my heart,” Marines said.
EMTs said similar accidents in that area are common, and the couple is now advocating for change that would benefit everyone and make the area safer, especially at night.
“I think it would just make it completely safer for families and everyone just to enjoy the park,” Scott said.
