A Santa Rosa resident was awarded a certificate of valor Friday at the Coast Guard Training Center in Petaluma for saving a drowning woman in 2009.
On Dec. 9, 2009, Richard Everett was driving southbound on Highway 1 north of Bodega Bay when he was approached by a woman who said that her sister was in the water and being overpowered by the waves.
Everett phoned 911 to alert authorities of the situation, then grabbed a rope from his vehicle and ran into the water at Portuguese Beach.
Everett threw the rope to the victim, who was barely conscious, and told her to hold on as he pulled her to shore. Timing the swells and waiting for a lull in the waves, which measured up to eight feet, Everett managed to pull the young woman to safety.
When paramedics arrived and stabilized the woman, they learned that she was six months pregnant at the time. It’s not clear why the victim entered the water in the first place.
