73-year-old Ocean City man saves her from rip current in resort
OCEAN CITY — A 73-year-old Ocean City man saw a young woman minutes from drowning being carried offshore by a rip current. He didn’t hesitate.
For saving her life last October, Frank John LaFerrara is one of 18 people awarded a Carnegie Medal for acts of extraordinary heroism.
The Carnegie Hero Fund Commission announced the 18 recipients from throughout the U.S. and Canada on June 22. The medals go to those who enter extreme danger while saving or attempting to save the lives of others.
LaFerrara, who works nights at the Acme on Eighth Street, earned the medal for the rescue Oct. 5, 2025, long after Ocean City’s lifeguards had gone off duty for the season. Ocean City’s beaches are not protected at that time of year.
LaFerrara said he was on the beach relaxing when he saw the woman getting carried beyond the end of the jetty by the Music Pier.
“It took a little bit of time to get her in, but I did it. She came up to me later on when she was all calmed down. She gave me a hug and looked into my eyes and said, ‘Thank you.’ That was my reward,” LaFerrara said.
She wasn’t calm in the ocean, taking him under when he first reached her some 200 feet from shore.
LaFerrara said he spends his free time at the beach because he works nights. He stays in excellent shape, is a very good swimmer and took a lifeguard course “a long time ago.” Last week, he told the Sentinel what happened.
“That girl would have died if I don’t get to her when I did. She didn’t have three or four minutes for 911 to respond with some kind of rescue equipment,” he said.
“She got caught in a rip current. I know what to do and how to get out of it,” LaFerrara said, describing the young woman as petite and in her late teens to early 20s.
“She didn’t know how to swim. That was the impression I got because she could barely tread water. I swam as hard as I could. The waves kept pushing me back,” he said. About 10 feet from her, he stopped to take a brief rest, but kept his eyes on her.
“I wanted to catch my breath because I’m going to need all my breath and energy once I get to her. I took a couple deep breaths and figured out what I had to do.” When he reached her, “she jumped on top of me on my shoulders, screaming ‘I don’t want to die.’ She pushed me under.”
LaFerrara got out from beneath her then grabbed her hands.
“I had her face me. I said, ‘Calm down. You’re not gonna die. I’m going to get you in. It’s going to take a little time,’” he said.
He held her with one arm and paddled with the other to get out of the rip current and then back to shore. “I couldn’t let her go because she didn’t know how to swim and I didn’t have any floats or anything to give her.”
A few waves pushed them under along the way, but after he got her to the point they could touch bottom and wade, another man came out with a float to help get them both the rest of the way in.
He pointed out — as lifeguards do — that many people don’t know what to do when caught in a rip current. They try to fight it, swimming against it directly back toward shore, and tire themselves out.
“They burn themselves out of energy, they can’t catch their breath and that’s really what kills them,” he said.
Swimmers caught in a rip current have to swim parallel to shore until the rip subsides, and then swim in without fighting the current.
Not surprisingly, LaFerrara has exercise equipment in his bedroom, works out six days a week doing cardio and weight-lifting and recently began Tai Chi.
“I eat extremely healthy and I take a lot of vitamins.”
He has been living on barrier islands the past 30 years and in Ocean City for the past two.
LaFerrara doesn’t know who nominated him for the award. A ceremony to give him the medal should be in September. He already was honored by the Life Saving Benevolent Association based in New York; they gave him a silver medal, a beautiful plaque and a luncheon in his honor.
He is excited about the award and about the publicity, but mainly to show something positive in a world that often features the negative.
“There are still good people in the world and good things happen every day,” he said. “We need more people to help. It’s a good thing for people to see instead of always war and crime and drugs and the economy.”
With this announcement June 22, the Carnegie Medal has been awarded to 10,581 individuals since the inception of the Pittsburgh-based fund in 1904. Each of the recipients or their survivors will receive a financial grant. Throughout the 122 years since the fund was established by industrialist-philanthropist Andrew Carnegie, nearly $47 million has been given in one-time grants, scholarship aid, death benefits and continuing assistance.
Carnegie created the Carnegie Hero Fund Commission on April 15, 1904. According to the organization, he founded it after a mine disaster claimed 181 lives, including those of two men who went into the mine to rescue the others.
“I do not expect to stimulate or create heroism by this fund,” he wrote, “knowing well that heroic action is impulsive. But I do believe that, if the hero is injured in his bold attempt to serve or save his fellows, he and those dependent upon him should not suffer pecuniarily.”
– STORY and PHOTO by DAVID NAHAN/Sentinel staff
