SYDNEY: A 13-year-old boy recounted on Tuesday how he swam for four hours through choppy waters off western Australia to get help for his family in a feat hailed by rescuers as “superhuman”.

The boy, named in local media as Austin Appelbee, made it across four kilometres of ocean to raise the alarm after his mother and two younger siblings were swept out to sea.

He had gone out kayaking and paddle-boarding on the water Friday afternoon with his family. But the waves soon grew, flipping their boards and filling their kayak with water as they were dragged further out into the ocean. “I was really scared,” the young teen told reporters.

When he reached the beach, the teen said he called emergency services and asked them to deploy boats, helicopters and planes, telling them: “My family is out at sea.” Marine rescue volunteer Paul Bresland said the teen’s four-hour swim saved his family, who were eventually found clinging to a paddleboard in the open ocean off the tourist town of Quindalup.

“I was just thinking in my head, like thinking I was going to make it through. But I was also thinking about all my friends at school, and friends at my Christian youth,” he said.

“I just said: ‘Alright, not today, not today, not today. I have to keep on going’.” The youngster said he started heading for shore with just his life jacket but later abandoned it to swim unencumbered. “I was very puffed out, but I couldn’t feel how tired I was.” The boy said he was trying to think of happy things, at one point singing the “Thomas the Tank Engine” theme song. “At this time, you know, the waves are massive, and I have no life jacket on. So any­way, I just keep swimming. I do breaststroke. I do freestyle. Survival backstroke.”

Published in Dawn, February 4th, 2026