Cape Town sports personality and teacher Irafaan Abrahams says he nearly died after being caught in a rip tide in Scarborough on Tuesday.
The marathon runner, known for raising funds for school shoes, says just as his life started flashing before his eyes, surfer Stephen “Dassie” Guess, noticed him in distress and saved him.
Irafaan explains: “The whole ordeal was recorded on my watch, seven minutes, that’s how long it took for us to swim out of the rip tide that I was caught in and 350m covered, can you imagine that!
“The one minute I was comfortably swimming parallel to the waves, the next moment I found myself being pulled into the ocean.
“I tried to stay calm at first but found myself going nowhere but backwards.
“I saw two boogie boarders and Dassie just as I became tired and crampy, I gathered my last energy and shouted and waved to the guys as best as I could.
“Stephen spotted my distress signal, at this time, my life just flashed by me.
“For a moment I felt I wasn’t going to make it back to shore.
“I spoke to my Creator, that’s when I heard Dassie calmly telling me to relax, and grab onto his leg.“
He swam bravely, I tried to help but I was tired and my legs were numb.
“After a few minutes that felt like hours, the two boogie boarders gave Stephen a break, and let me onto the boogie board, while they paddled the board towards the shore.
“Eventually we got to a sand bank where I could just about stand. Dassie stayed with me.”
An emotional Irafaan says Dassie is a hero: “This is really a story of someone I know from nowhere risking his own life coming into the water to save me and this is what has now changed my life forever.”
The onnie says to give thanks to Allah, he would be donating food at the Kapteinsklip informal settlement last night, adding: “I also invited Dassie who gladly accepted the invitation. He saved my life by the grace of God.”
He says the experience has now inspired him to take part in his first triathlon.
Stephen, who recently took up open-water swimming, says it’s a blessing being able to help someone who does so much for others.
He says: “A few years ago on Boxing Day, I witnessed someone drowning and it was very traumatic. On Tuesday when I saw this, I literally felt like I wasn’t going to watch something like that happen again, so I jumped in.
“What’s even more wholesome is that becoming selfless was one of my goals for 2024, and now I will be doing just that.”