Walk in the Woods: Submerged in Icy Water

Summary

Real Survival Stories

Episode Title: Walk in the Woods: Submerged in Icy Water

Host: John Hopkins
Date: June 24, 2026

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Episode Overview

This episode tells the harrowing survival story of Kelly Dwyer, who—while recovering from chronic Lyme disease—fell through the ice of a New Hampshire pond on a bitter February evening in 2011. The episode follows her ordeal in the freezing water, her husband David’s desperate search and rescue, the fight of the medical teams to revive her after clinical death, and the lasting impact on their family and community. Through intimate narration and firsthand accounts, it’s a powerful testimony to love, resilience, and the collective will to never give up.

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Key Discussion Points & Insights

1. Setting the Scene: Ordinary Day Turns Tragic ([00:33]–[04:49])

• Opening imagery: A flashlight beam in dense winter woods; David Dwyer searching for his missing wife.
• Kelly’s walk: Kelly heads out for a stroll with snowshoes, a sign of recovery from her health struggles, bringing hope to their day.
• First sign of crisis: David notices Kelly has not returned; anxiety grows as dusk falls.

Quote:

“My mind is thinking it’s odd that she’s not here, it’s odd she’s not on the path walking back, meeting me. So something is now wrong.”
— David Dwyer ([04:49])

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2. Kelly’s Health Journey ([06:47]–[09:27])

• Backstory of illness: Kelly battled mysterious symptoms for years—fatigue, pain, weakness—before receiving a diagnosis of Lyme disease.
• David describes the frustration and fear of not knowing what was wrong, only to find relief in a diagnosis but decline nonetheless.

Quote:

“For about three years prior to 2011, I had started to develop really mysterious physical symptoms… Slowly, over maybe a year, I became really ill.”
— Kelly Dwyer ([07:41])

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3. The Accident: Falling Through the Ice ([13:44]–[16:55])

• Naturalist’s caution: Kelly is familiar with the pond and aware of weak ice near beaver lodges, but a small deviation changes everything.
• Plunge into freezing water: Kelly describes confusion and the sudden, paralyzing cold—her last memory is desperate screaming for help.
• Her cell phone fails, and exhaustion overtakes her.

Quote:

“I remember screaming, screaming, screaming for help. And that’s really all I remember. That’s my last memory of that day.”
— Kelly Dwyer ([16:32])

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4. David’s Search and Discovery ([17:28]–[26:28])

• Family routine: Kelly’s absence is brought to David’s attention by their daughter, prompting his increasingly anxious search.
• Dark woods: David’s growing panic is palpable as he tracks through darkness, calling his wife’s name; what returns seems inhuman.

Quote:

“There was a rhythm. Something is answering me, yelling Kelly is. Something is answering back. Something. Someone.”
— David Dwyer ([22:12])

• Discovery: David follows the animalistic noises and finds Kelly, barely conscious, her face “ghostly pale” in the freezing water.

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5. Rescue and Medical Response ([26:45]–[36:12])

• Desperate attempted rescue: David lies prone on the ice, grabs Kelly by her coat, but cannot pull her out; Kelly slips into unconsciousness.
• He nearly considers jumping in himself when firefighters arrive. A rescuer in a dry suit enters the water and secures Kelly for extraction.

Quote:

“The firefighter in the water is looking at me, saying, ‘I’ve got her. You can let her go.’ ... Looking at me, saying, ‘Trust me. I have her. You can let her go.’”
— David Dwyer ([29:29])

• CPR and transport: Kelly is rushed to hospital, receiving CPR. David observes the traumatic scene, recognizing the gravity of her condition: “Basically, Kelly’s dead. They’re giving CPR. The only reason you get CPR is because your heart’s not pumping. If your heart’s not pumping, you’re not alive.” ([32:39])

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6. Medical Ordeal: Death and Resurrection ([37:00]–[40:03])

• Prolonged resuscitation: Kelly is clinically dead for over 3 hours; multiple teams attempt to revive her—despite standard medical wisdom.
• Difficult decisions: David is asked to consent to a final procedure to warm Kelly’s heart with bypass, realizing: “Because she’s dead, they needed permission to keep trying.” ([36:12])
• Miracle moment: Cardiac bypass works; Kelly’s heart restarts. Doctors warn the family not to celebrate yet, as severe brain damage is a possibility.

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7. Recovery and Reflection ([40:36]–[45:22])

• Regaining consciousness: Six days later, Kelly wakes with no memory of the ordeal, bewildered by her surroundings. Neurological assessment suggests a miraculous absence of brain damage.
• Physical toll: Lasting nerve damage in her hands, grueling physical therapy, but nearly full recovery.
• Community and gratitude: The Dwyers reflect deeply on the unwavering support of medical staff, family, and their wider community.

Quotes:

"This is not a story about me. This is a story about the never give up spirit of a community and of a family and of people that are there to take care of each other. Nobody ever gave up on me."
— Kelly Dwyer ([46:43])

"There’s just so many beautiful people...she brought this normalcy to this awful situation. She just showed up every day."
— David Dwyer ([45:39])

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Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments

• “Her eyes look like you would think you can envision an animal caught in a trap... this frantic, wild animal looking eyes and she opened her mouth and that noise that I had been hearing came out of her.”
  — David Dwyer ([23:49])

• “My work on this planet was not done. I had two incredible young girls to continue to raise. I had a family... There was still a lot of fun to be had... it was not my time because I still had things I wanted and had to do.”
  — Kelly Dwyer ([44:27])

• “She has a pulse.” (A firefighter, giving hope amid dire circumstances, overheard by David) ([30:14])

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Timestamps for Important Segments

• 00:33 – Opening scene: David searching the woods
• 04:49 – David realizes Kelly is missing
• 07:41 – Kelly recalls years of mysterious illness
• 13:44 – Kelly describes her love for the winter landscape and the beaver pond
• 15:33 – Kelly plunges through the ice
• 16:32 – Kelly’s last memory: screaming for help
• 22:12 – David describes hearing the animalistic echo
• 23:49 – David finds Kelly in the water
• 26:28 – David’s attempt to rescue Kelly
• 29:29 – Firefighters pull Kelly from the ice
• 32:39 – David sees CPR efforts, realizes gravity
• 36:12 – David consents to final resuscitation attempt
• 39:14 – Kelly stabilized; still comatose
• 40:52 – Kelly regains consciousness
• 41:42 – Neurologist clears Kelly for brain function
• 43:27 – Kelly discusses rehabilitation of her hands
• 44:27 – Kelly on her determination to live
• 45:39 – David on the generosity of community

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Episode Themes & Tone

• Themes: Survival against overwhelming odds, the importance of decisive action, the power of love and family, the role of community, and medical perseverance.
• Tone: Candid, suspenseful, emotional, ultimately inspirational. The storytelling is grounded in vivid imagery and honest reflection.

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Summary

This episode delivers a deeply detailed, emotionally rich account of a near-fatal accident, emphasizing both the narrow margin between life and death and the collective will required in the fight for survival. The narrative is anchored in Kelly and David’s firsthand accounts, offering listeners not just the facts of rescue but unfiltered insight into what it means for a family, and a community, to refuse to give up hope. For those seeking a gripping tale of real-life resilience and the “never give up” spirit, this story is both heart-pounding and heartwarming.

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Next Episode Preview:
A park ranger stalked by an apex predator in the Rockies—another testament to the unpredictability of nature and human perseverance.

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Transcript

[David Dwyer]

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[Narrator]

It's February 13, 2011, in the woods of New Hampshire just outside the town of Hookset. The beam of a flashlight weaves through the trees, making fleeting incisions in the darkness. Ranks of densely packed evergreens appear in its glare, their trunks slender and pale, their slumped boughs stiffened with frost. 43 year old David Dwyer, flashlight in hand, staggers through the snow, his eyes scouring the slivers of shadow between the pines. His voice resonates through the dark forest, echoing the same two syllables. KELLY Eventually, David emerges into open space, a circular clear and covered in a blanket of pillowy white. Though it's not immediately obvious, this clearing is in fact a pond, frozen over and buried by snow. David stands at the pond's edge, his breath fogging the frigid night air. He points his torch beam towards the opposite bank, where the black mass of the forest stands out against the darkening sky. David calls out again.

[Kelly Dwyer]

Kelly.

[Narrator]

Once the echo of his own voice has faded, he listens, his ears pricked, his senses sharpened to a fine point. And then he hears something. It sounds like a wounded animal ensnared in barbed wire, a throaty, feral groan. His pulse quickening, David directs another yell into the dark void that surrounds him. Again. He waits.

[David Dwyer]

And again, whatever that noise was, it didn't sound human. But it's not like I'm making a noise and a howl is, you know, calling back, or a coyote's howling at the moon. There was a rhythm. Something is answering me, yelling, Kelly. Something is answering back. Something. Someone.

[Narrator]

The sound is primal, an expression of pure animal distress. But it also seems to be answering him. Whenever David shouts Kelly's name, the sound comes back. David starts inching his way along the edge of the pond, following the direction of the sound.

[David Dwyer]

I just kept walking and trying to follow this animalistic noise. And enough time went by that all of a sudden my flashlight picks up this black hole in this frozen white landscape.

[Narrator]

David stares. It looks like a blot of ink on a pristine page, a little circle of black against the surrounding white expanse, a hole in the ice. He trains the flashlight on it. And there, staring out from the hole, surrounded by freezing black water, her face like a ghost, is David's wife, Kelly.

[David Dwyer]

Her eyes look like you would think. You can envision an animal caught in a trap, this frantic wild animal looking eyes and she opened her mouth and that noise that I had been hearing came out of her.

[Narrator]

Ever wondered what you would do when disaster strikes? If your life depended on your next decision, could you make the right choice? Welcome to Real Survival Stories. These are the astonishing tales of ordinary people thrown into extraordinary situations. People suddenly forced to fight for their lives. In this episode we meet husband and wife David and Kelly Dwyer on a winter's evening in New Hampshire in 2011. David is at home in his study when he notices that Kelly hasn't come back from her walk in the woods. Strapping on his snowshoes, he heads out to look for her.

[David Dwyer]

My mind is thinking it's odd that she's not here, it's odd she's not on the path walking back, meeting me. So something is now wrong.

[Narrator]

But the situation is even worse than David fears. Because unbeknownst to him, Kelly isn't merely lost or injured. She is unconscious, barely clinging onto life, submerged up to her neck in freezing water.

[Kelly Dwyer]

And I remember screaming, screaming, screaming for help. And that's really all I remember. That's my last memory of that day.

[Narrator]

As Kelly slips into a hypothermic stupor. David will have to perform heroics to reach her in time. How will he get her out without risking his own life too? What will be the consequences of Kelly's hours spent trapped beneath the ice? Can she quite literally come back from the dead? I'm John Hopkins from the Noiser Podcast Network. This is Real Survival Stories. It's the afternoon of Sunday, February 13, 2011, in a sprawling area of woodland about a mile outside the small town of Hoxet, New Hampshire. Kelly Dwyer happily picks her way along a path through the evergreens. Bright winter sun slants through gaps in the trees, dappling the forest floor with shifting patterns of light and shade. Kelly, a dark haired woman of 46, breathes in the cold pine resin filled air and listens to the sound of the wind stirring the branches.

[Kelly Dwyer]

Trees are very symbolic to me because in the winter here the shadows in February are beautiful. Incredible lighting. It does something different to the bones of the trees, the deciduous trees, when they've lost their leaves, you can see their skeletal structure and I would always look out at that and just marvel.

[Narrator]

Kelly walks slowly, methodically lifting Each snowshoe before placing it back down. With careful precision, she takes periodic breaks, holding onto tree branches for support while she stops to recover strength, her body wracked with deep, heaving breaths. There was a time when Kelly wouldn't have struggled with exercise like this. But for the last few years, she's been battling a health condition. Her whose symptoms, fatigue, muscle pain, nausea, have made it difficult for her to lead a normal active Life.

[Kelly Dwyer]

For about three years prior to 2011, I had started to develop really mysterious physical symptoms. Slowly, over maybe a year, I became really ill. And this was from someone who was extremely energetic, very strong, determined, very healthy. And then things just started to slowly deteriorate.

[Narrator]

As the months passed, Kelly's health continued to decline. She and her husband David spent countless hours meeting with various specialists, but nobody seemed able to identify the cause.

[David Dwyer]

She was tested for ms, she was tested for cancer, she was tested for other neurological diseases, diabetes. She had monitors and halter monitors and every diagnosis seemed like, well, maybe that, that sounds logical, only to have it ruled out in only her to keep getting sicker and sicker.

[Narrator]

About a year ago, after endless consultations and misdiagnoses, a doctor finally identified the mystery ailment. It was Lyme disease, a bacterial infection transmitted via the bite of a ticket and which if left untreated, can develop into a long term chronic illness. Now, with a correct diagnosis and an intensive course of antibiotics, there is finally light at the end of the tunnel for Kelly. But there are still good days and bad days. Today started off as a bad one. Earlier this morning, she barely had the energy to get dressed, let alone go outside. So it seemed like a positive sign when in the early afternoon she came to David and told him she felt strong enough to take a stroll through the woods.

[David Dwyer]

So for her to in the early afternoon to say, I'm going outside, I'm strapping on my snowshoes and I'm going to the beaver pond, I'm going for a hike was excellent news. That was exciting. That's great. She's feeling good enough to just get out there and enjoy the sun and enjoy the day.

[Narrator]

David and Kelly have been married for almost 20 years. When they first met at a work conference back in the early 90s, David was a fresh faced recent college graduate from small town New Hampshire. Kelly was three years older, an ambitious young professional from Boston embarking on a career in social services. Their spark was instantaneous.

[David Dwyer]

For me, I walked in and it absolutely was love at first sight. She was actually working the registration table and when I approached Her. I actually stumbled on what my name was, to give her my name, to get my name tagged. I was just struck by her. And throughout the conference as she spoke and she did various things and I realized, wow, she's not only beautiful, but she's intelligent.

[Kelly Dwyer]

I was struck by how his eyes first looked almost like deep, soulful eyes. But he also was so kind and there was just something about him that seemed to be in alignment with how I want to show up is being kind, to be empathetic and to be sort of insightful regarding people.

[Narrator]

Despite the mutual attraction, the timing proved problematic. Both were seeing other people and they left the conference with nothing but a sense of what might have been. Six months later, fate handed them another chance.

[David Dwyer]

I went back again for another conference in September, and as fate would have it, we were both single at that point. So we ended up hanging out outside of the conference, going out to dinner. It was at Hampton beach in New Hampshire. So the second night we were walking on the beach and I told her I was already falling in love with her.

[Narrator]

Fortunately, David's forwardness didn't scare Kelly off and it didn't take long before the feeling was reciprocated. The pair got married, had two daughters, Laura and Catherine, and moved to the town of Hoexet, New Hampshire, just north of where David grew up in Manchester. They built their home from the ground up after purchasing a plot of land that abuts a large wooded conservation area.

[David Dwyer]

It's a beautiful nook, this little parcel, this little two acres of the world. We refer to it as our sanctuary. We just love being outside, putting in the gardens, getting our hands dirty.

[Narrator]

As nature lovers, David and Kelly have deliberately built their home to coexist with the natural environment. Their backyard slopes seamlessly into the woods, connected by a single footpath. In the winter, when the ground is covered by snow, any distinction between the Dwyer's property and the conservation area beyond it is erased, obliterated by a single unifying carpet of white, such that it becomes impossible to tell where their sanctuary ends and where unforgiving wilderness begins. It's about three in the afternoon. Kelly follows a path through the woods to the edge of a frozen pond. This is one of her favorite places on earth. On days when her health permits it, she likes to come out here to watch the birds through her binoculars. The finches, robins and woodpeckers that roost in the trees around the water. The pond itself is home to a family of beavers. Their lodges, dome shaped dens constructed from sticks and mud, rise above the frozen surface like primitive bunkers.

[Kelly Dwyer]

And I remember that day being just brilliant, brilliant sunshine on the snow over the pond. And I did not have sunglasses. And trying to look at the glare of the snow, it almost seemed like there was millions of, like little bright lights that were dancing.

[Narrator]

Kelly steps onto the thick ice and heads to the right. This is the route she normally takes across the frozen water. A path of trampled snow tells her where to place her feet, where she knows the ice is strong enough to support her. Featherweight, 115 pounds. She knows to avoid areas of the pond where the beavers are most active, as the ice here is likely to have been weakened over time.

[Kelly Dwyer]

They store or cache their food for the winter near the lodge. Not right adjacent to the lodge, but usually about 10 or 12ft away. They anchor those large branches into the mud, and I know that there's weak ice around that because of the activity of coming in and out of the lodge. So I knew to give that area a wide berth.

[Narrator]

Kelly takes another few steps forward. At this point, it's hard to say exactly what happens next. Kelly herself can't say for sure. Maybe she pauses, lifting her head to admire the treetops above the opposite bank. Maybe a bird flies over, distracting her for a single critical second, pulling her attention away from the ice beneath her feet.

[Kelly Dwyer]

So something must have compelled me to either step forward or step backward off of that, I think probably about 5ft from my usual blaze trail. Whether something flew over and I took a step forward or back to look at it with my binoculars, I don't know why I went off that safe trail.

[Narrator]

All anyone can say for sure is that when Kelly puts her foot down, there is a loud crack, a sudden lurch of weightlessness and a paralyzing shock of cold as she plunges vertically through the ice and disappears beneath the water's inky black surface. As her muscles tighten and contract, Kelly acts quickly. She kicks off her heavy metal snowshoes and flings her forearms onto the solid ice, trying to heave herself back up. But the slippery, unstable edges coupled with the numbing effects of the cold, make this action impossible. Kelly reaches into her coat and pulls out her cell phone, but it must have shorted out after hitting the water. The screen is black and unresponsive. She grips the edge of the hole and gasps for breath, fighting to maintain a sense of clarity against the dizzying effects of the extreme cold.

[Kelly Dwyer]

I remember screaming toward a development past a wooded area near the pond. And I remember screaming, screaming, screaming for help to the point where my Voice went hoarse. And that's really all I remember. That's my last memory of that day.

[Narrator]

It's about 5pm in the Dwyer household. Shafts of late afternoon sunlight filter softly through the sash windows as David Dwyer potters about his study. Somewhere his daughter Laura is practicing her flute. In another room, 12 year old Catherine is finishing some homework. Aside from these little pockets of activity, the house is a hush of calm. Shadows lengthen across well worn floorboards. Warm air murmurs from heating vents.

[David Dwyer]

It's a normal, relaxing Sunday. Not a lot of care in the world. There was no errands to run, There was no commitments to honor. It was just a nice, relaxing, beautiful Sunday type you hope you get every now and then so you can just rejuvenate.

[Narrator]

David is in his study getting some things ready for work in the morning when his daughter Catherine pokes her head into the room. She wants to know where her mum is. Shouldn't she be home by now? David glances at the time.

[David Dwyer]

Kelly had a routine where she'd walk out to the beaver pond and go for a hike around the woods and would try to always end around dusk to see all the various, various birds that would roost for the night. She came to know which birds were going into which tree at night, so she would stay with her binoculars until, you know, everybody went into their hole and roosted for the night and then she come back home.

[Narrator]

David reassures Catherine that he wouldn't expect Kelly home before dusk. Then he turns back to his computer. But a short while later, Catherine comes back into the room, her forehead creased with concern.

[David Dwyer]

Catherine came in and said, well, shouldn't mom be home by now? And when I looked it was dark and yes, she should have been home by now. Now this is odd.

[Narrator]

The sky beyond the window is a deep indigo, slowly transitioning into black. David tells his daughter not to fret. He's sure everything's fine, but he'd still better go out to look for Kelly. She may have lost track of time. David puts on his coat, hat and gloves. He straps on his snowshoes and grabs a flashlight. Then he opens the door and steps out into the gathering gloom. David walks purposefully, but not with any great urgency. There is no immediate reason to be concerned for Kelly's well being. But as he steps into the shadows of the trees, night seems to steal over him all at once.

[David Dwyer]

By the time I got of our yard into the woods, it was dark. Now there's no fooling myself that the sun is going down and there's a little Light. It was downright dark.

[Narrator]

The beam of David's flashlight probes the darkness as he trudges deeper into the snow laden woods. Slender trunks and spindly branches loom on either side of the footpath. Any second now, Kelly will surely appear around a corner apologizing for causing any unnecessary concern. But the further David walks, the less sure this becomes.

[David Dwyer]

Halfway from our house to the beaver pond. I started, you know, yelling her name just in case she had fallen somewhere. And again my mind is thinking it's odd that she's not here. She's not on the path. It's odd she's not home yet. But it's odd she's not on the path. Walking back, meeting me. So something is now wrong.

[Narrator]

Could she have tripped and sprained an ankle? Kelly's battle with Lyme disease can leave her feeling weak and unsteady on her feet. David quickens his pace until eventually he reaches the pond.

[David Dwyer]

It wasn't until I got all the way to the pond's edge that no Kelly and this is not good would make sense. She's on the path. My brain is thinking logically. She's on the path. She's walking back. Even if she broke her leg, she's on the path. So now that I'm at this pond surrounded by woods, where is she? Where could she be?

[Narrator]

David stands at the edge of the pond, shining his light's beam out across the frozen surface. He shouts Kelly's name, his voice gruff with anxiety.

[David Dwyer]

And it's pitch black out. So as I'm yelling, I yell her name again. This noise to the right way off in the distance comes back. It's hard for me to describe. I can't describe. I can't mimic the noise. The best I can describe it was an animalistic noise coming from the dark over to the right on the pond.

[Narrator]

He strains his ears. It sounds like a wounded animal, except it seems to be answering him, calling back whenever he shouts Kelly's name.

[David Dwyer]

Whatever that noise was, it didn't sound human. But it's not like I'm making a noise and then howl is calling back or a coyote's howling at the moon. There was a rhythm. Something is answering me, yelling Kelly is. Something is answering back. Something. Someone.

[Narrator]

With shaky hands, David takes out his phone.

[David Dwyer]

I called the house. Laura picked up and I told Laura, call 91 1. And Laura, the poor 14 year old is what's wrong? I said I, I don't know. I haven't found mom yet. But something's wrong, call 91 1. When they get to the house, tell them how to take the path down to the pond and I'm going to the right. Tell them when they get to the pond to go to the right. And she said okay. And we hung up.

[Narrator]

David slides the phone back into his pocket. Then flashlight poised and ears pricked, he starts edging carefully around the snowy bank.

[David Dwyer]

I just kept walking and trying to follow this animalistic noise and enough time went by that all of a sudden my flashlight picks up this black hole in this frozen white landscape.

[Narrator]

It looks like a blot of ink on a white page. A six foot wide hole in the ice. And staring out from it a stricken face, ghostly pale, is Kelly.

[David Dwyer]

Her eyes look like you would think you can envision an animal caught in a trap. This frantic wild animal looking eyes and she opened her mouth and that noise that I had been hearing came out of her. So it was her. It was just awful to see. To see her and see hear that noise come from her. She was conscious. Obviously she's making this noise but she wasn't there. She wasn't looking at me. She was an animal caught in a trap.

[Narrator]

David stands at the edge of the frozen pond, his torch beam aimed at a six foot wide hole in the ice. Kelly stares into the glare like a deer caught in the headlights. Her shockingly pale face framed by the dark water that surrounds it. The cold has drained the blood from her skin, leaving it mottled and translucent as tracing paper, revealing the blue veins and arteries beneath. Her sodden hair is plastered against her skull in lank oil black strands. Her eyes are wide but they're vacant, unseeing. David fumbles for his cell phone.

[David Dwyer]

I called the house real quick and Laura said I called 911, they're on the way. I said call them back. She goes, but I already called them. I said just call them back and tell them Mom's in the water. They gotta be prepared to water rescue. They gotta get her out of the water. They gotta come prepared.

[Narrator]

He hangs up while on the phone David has managed to unbuckle his snowshoes. Now he steps gingerly onto the pond's frozen surface and inches towards Kelly. The ice creaks menacingly beneath his weight.

[David Dwyer]

I'm now standing on ice. I could fall through ice too. And how am I gonna get to her? So I just laid down, put my body flat and then slowly inched over towards the hole.

[Narrator]

David spreads his weight as evenly as he can. He calls out reassurances to Kelly, letting her know that he's coming. The deep snow Piles into David's face as he bellies his way across the ice, squirming and wriggling, dragging himself by the elbows. Eventually, he reaches her.

[David Dwyer]

I reached down into the hole and just grabbed her by the back of the collar, by her coat. She still had her red winter coat on. I could see it sticking out of the water. So I just grabbed her collar of her coat and had her. Grabbed her.

[Narrator]

David pulls Kelly to the edge of the hole, his gloved hands gripping the saturated fabric of her coat. The freezing water soaks through the down of his winter jacket. Within seconds, his blood has turned to ice. It raises a terrifying question. How long has Kelly been submerged? How could she have survived more than a few minutes in water this cold? David wraps his arms around Kelly's chest and tries to hoist her out, but it's no use.

[David Dwyer]

You can't reach in a hole lying down on snow and magically pick somebody up and pluck them down. So I couldn't get her out that way. I didn't know what to do.

[Narrator]

He lies there prostrate on the ice, his wife a dead weight in his arms. Since David reached her, Kelly seems to have lost whatever remnant of consciousness she had left and is now threatening to slip out of his grasp.

[David Dwyer]

She's totally unconscious now, and she would have just slipped under, under this black. This black ink and just disappeared. So I had to pull her up because her head is now passed out, tilting forward. I had to hold her out of water higher to keep her face from pitching forward into water.

[Narrator]

David holds on tight, constantly shifting and readjusting his grip as his wife's head flops around limp. Having established that pulling Kelly out from this position is physically impossible, David must come up with another solution. He soon arrives at a radical one.

[David Dwyer]

I thought, all right, I'll slip into the hole, I'll go in and I'll push her out. That would have been a very bad plan, but that's what I was about to do when I could see in the woods and hear. I could hear voices and flashlights.

[Narrator]

David looks up. Beams of light weave through the trees as a team of firefighters barrel through the forest towards the pond. It's hard to say how long it's been since he spoke to Laura, but it can't be more than 15 minutes. The firefighters soon reach the spot on the bank where David dropped his flashlight. He can see that one of them is dressed in what looks like scuba gear, a full body dry suit. Three firefighters make their way over to David and Kelly, the one in the dry suit slips into the water and wraps Kelly in a bear hug. There is a rope tied around his waist, and the two firefighters on the ice hold the other end of it. The next step is to pull them out.

[David Dwyer]

The firefighter in the water is looking at me, saying, I've got her. You can let her go. He had to say it again. He might even had to say it three times. And the third time was very kind and gentle. Looking at me, saying, trust me. I have her. You can let her go. So I did it.

[Narrator]

It's a few minutes later. The rescue team carries Kelly through the woods on a stretcher. David walks in front, illuminating the footpath with his flashlight

[David Dwyer]

the whole walk. I have this illusion she's got to be fine, because when they pulled her out of the hole and they're strapping her down, I heard one of the firefighters turn to the other two. He wasn't talking to me. He was talking to the other two. She has a pulse. So the whole walk back, I'm thinking, well, you have a pulse, right? We have a pulse. Hot chocolate, warm shower. We'll be laughing about this in an hour in our house. All will be well and all will be right in the world.

[Narrator]

But when they reach the backyard, David's wishful thinking evaporates. Instead of carrying Kelly inside the house, the firefighters rush her to the driveway, where they load her into the back of an ambulance. David watches, helpless, as his wife is whisked out of sight. The scene in front of the house is chaotic. There must be half a dozen vehicles parked here. Police cars, fire engines, ambulances. A tumult of wailing sirens and red and blue flashing lights. Worried neighbors cluster around the foot of the drive, craning their necks. David stands in the middle of it all, in a state of shock. A firefighter comes over to him and starts asking questions about what happened. But David can't focus. He pushes past the firefighter and staggers over to the ambulance. The rear doors are closed, so he peers in through the window.

[David Dwyer]

And when I looked into the ambulance, there was three firefighters leaning over this naked body of white, translucent human skin, giving her cpr. And another firefighter has a mask on her face, pumping air into her nose and mouth.

[Narrator]

David watches, horrified, as the emergency workers try to resuscitate Kelly. None of this makes any sense. He heard the firefighters say that Kelly had a pulse. From somewhere nearby, he hears a voice telling him they're going to take Kelly to the nearest hospital. David asks if he can ride along in the ambulance, but the voice tells him there is no room. He'll have to drive himself. David pulls himself away from the scene in the ambulance and rushes to the house to speak to the girls. He explains that their mom is being taken to the hospital and asks if they want to come.

[David Dwyer]

The girls both took a step back and no, we'll wait here. I could see it in their eyes, even though I didn't even tell them what I just saw. Basically, Kelly's dead. They're giving cpr. The only reason you get CPR is because your heart's not pumping. If your heart's not pumping, you're not alive. I can't say any of that.

[Narrator]

As David struggles to find the right words, Laura steps towards him, her voice full of comforting reassurance.

[David Dwyer]

Laura said, dad, she came, approached me and put her hands on my arms and said, mom's gonna be okay. And I had to decide, do I give her that big of a false sense of security or my brain was just firing fast and making decision fast. So I just looked at Laura and said, I don't know if she's going to be all right. This is serious. And that's all I said. And Laura took a step back and said, then get going, as if she now believes, I'm gonna go save her mom.

[Narrator]

It's about half an hour later, David runs through the brightly lit corridors of the emergency room at Every Elliot Hospital in Manchester. Eventually, he finds the room where Kelly is being treated.

[David Dwyer]

I just leaned against this wall, staring at this room in front of me, and there's Kelly on a hospital emergency room bed with 12, 15, I don't know, a lot of hospital people running around, a lot of monitors, a lot of tubes in her.

[Narrator]

All of a sudden, as David stands there, his back against the wall, everything becomes a blur. The blinking monitors, the tubes pumping warm water into Kelly's bloodstream. The swift, precise movements of the medical staff. The sense of powerlessness is overwhelming. But David's not going anywhere.

[David Dwyer]

Kelly and I know each other very well. She's been the love of my life ever since the day I met her. She would not want to be alone. It's that simple.

[Narrator]

Soon, David is joined in the hospital by Kelly's parents, who have driven up from Massachusetts. His own mother is here, too. They sit in the waiting room, anxiously awaiting news. David, meanwhile, remains in the ward, unwilling to part from Kelly. Hours pass, and still the CPR continues. The heart monitor beside Kelly's bed registers an ominous flat line. No trace of electrical activity, no trace of life.

[David Dwyer]

She hasn't had a heartbeat for two hours. And I'm watching everybody trying everything. And this person, nurse, doctor, I'm not sure which was approaching me out of the corner of my eye, coming up to tell me something. And I could feel dread of probably saying, we've tried everything.

[Narrator]

As the medic approaches, David braces for the worst. But she doesn't deliver the bad news he is expecting. She explains that while they've done everything they can here at this hospital, there is another hospital nearby with a larger and better equipped cardiac team. They'd like to move Kelly there to try one last procedure to save her life. But before they do, they need David to sign off on it.

[David Dwyer]

If you give us permission to send Kelly over there, they're going to try to warm her heart with bypass, to try to warm her blood, to try to start her heart there. And I remember just so, what an odd question. They need my permission. I, like, immediately said, well, yes, do that. You have a plan, let's do that. And she said, okay, we're going to do that right now. And as she walks away, I'm just like, why would they have asked that? And I realized, because she's dead, they needed permission to keep trying.

[Narrator]

It's the early hours of the morning of February 14, 2011. A quiet night at the CMC Hospital in Manchester, New Hampshire. Then, all of a sudden, an ambulance screeches up to the entrance of the er A female patient is wheeled through the doors and whisked to the icu, where a team of specialist heart doctors swarm around her. As they begin prepping the patient's unconscious body, the doctors exchange worried glances. They have already been briefed on the patient's condition. She has suffered a cardiac arrest triggered by hypothermia. And continued attempts to restart her heart have failed. Even after efforts to warm her, the patient's internal body temperature sits at an unsurvivable 27 degrees Celsius, or about 10 degrees below normal. Their last recourse is a cardiopulmonary bypass, a surgical procedure in which the blood is removed from the body, warmed up, then pumped back into the patient's veins. The chances that it will work are vanishingly slim.

[David Dwyer]

So she arrived at CMC with no brainwave and no heartbeat. And they're looking at the clock going, this is over three hours, three hours of cpr, and we're hooking her up to a bypass machine. And they were like, why? Why are they sending this? They questioned why they would send this poor woman over here in this condition.

[Narrator]

Despite the grim prognosis. The cardiac team gets to work. About an hour later, one of the doctors steps into the waiting room, where David and his family members sit in agonizing uncertainty. David jumps to his feet, nerves shredded. But this time, the doctor has a positive update. The bypass worked. They have warmed Kelly up, and they've got a heartbeat. It's still too soon to celebrate. The doctor warns the family that Kelly remains in a coma and will need to be kept on life support. David and the others are allowed to go in and see her.

[David Dwyer]

She didn't look alive. She didn't look like Kelly, but she was alive. Her heart was pumping. She could not breathe on her own, but her heart was pumping on her own.

[Narrator]

And this is how she remains through the next day and the next. For six days, Kelly is kept in this room in the icu, hooked up to various machines and monitors. As well as raising her body temperature and restarting her heart, doctors have to pump water and pond muck from Kelly's lungs. Even if she does come out of the coma, there's a high likelihood that she will have sustained brain damage during those hours that she was medically dead. Throughout it all, David seldom leaves her side.

[David Dwyer]

I lived my life hearing she's not dead or happy, how she's responding to this medicine, but her kidneys aren't working and she still may not make it. And me just looking at the doctor saying, you could finish your sentence that way all you want. She's alive. And that's all I can go with, right? I can't deal with the what ifs.

[Narrator]

It is several days later in a room in the icu. Kelly is lying in her hospital bed, hooked up to a confusion of tubes and wires, when suddenly her eyelids twitch.

[Kelly Dwyer]

I remember opening my eyes and looking around and wondering, what on earth? Where am I? What happened? And I thought. My first thought was, I must have got electrocuted. I have no idea why I thought that.

[Narrator]

Slowly, Kelly returns to life. She can't speak or move her arms and legs, but as the doctors fuss around her bedside, Kelly's eyes flit around the room, alert and conscious. Later, when a medic is asking David about her medication, Kelly, who is following the conversation, tries to interject. She mumbles inaudibly through her ventilator. David repeats the names of the medications, and Kelly confirms with a movement of

[Kelly Dwyer]

her head, I must have nodded. And at that time, the neurologist stepped and said, I can tell you right now, I'm signing off on her. Her brain seems to be functioning fine. The fact that she can even process the question and provide a somewhat garbled answer through the ventilator, I think that we feel pretty confident that she didn't suffer any lasting neurological issues to her brain or her cognitive abilities.

[Narrator]

Soon, doctors deemed Kelly well enough to breathe on her own. They remove the ventilator, enabling her to speak. At this stage, Kelly still has no recollection of falling through the ice. Not wanting to alarm her, David initially made up a story about an accident at home. But now that she's fully awake, he asks if she wants to know the truth.

[Kelly Dwyer]

And so he started to tell me how he found me in the icy hole. And the nursing team came flooding into the room, and they said, what's the matter? What's the matter? And David said, I was telling her what happened. And because my heart rate was high, the blood pressure, everything, all of my vitals sort of went off the charts. With the trauma of hearing what actually happened,

[Narrator]

Kelly might not have any conscious memory of the time she spent trapped under the ice, but she still carries the trauma. After several more days of monitoring, she is discharged from hospital and allowed to continue her recovery at home. It is a long and grueling journey. She spends many hours with a physical therapist working to regain mobility in her hands, which suffered extensive nerve damage.

[Kelly Dwyer]

I'll never forget the first time, about three months after my accident, A simple thing like crossing my fingers, and I sobbed and I thought, oh, my gosh. So I had adaptive utensils and things for quite a while, but I regained about 90% of the mobility and strengthened my hands. There's still some damage, but that's a small price to pay for being alive.

[Narrator]

Aside from some lasting nerve damage, Kelly continues to make a full recovery. It is a miraculous defiance of the odds. The medical staff estimate that she must have spent two hours in the pond and that she probably only had minutes left to live when David found her. When reflecting on her survival, Kelly maintains that dying that night was simply not part of the script.

[Kelly Dwyer]

My work on this planet was not done. I had two incredible young girls to continue to raise. I had a family, my parents, my siblings. There was still a lot of fun to be had. There's still a lot of incredible experiences, and it was not my time because I still had things I wanted and had to do.

[Narrator]

Still, how differently things could have gone had David not acted so swiftly and so decisively. For Kelly, his actions that night simply reinforced something she already knew about her husband.

[Kelly Dwyer]

He's somebody that really, he will have your back. He's the most trustworthy, insightful person I've ever met. And he seems to know what needs to be done, what someone's feeling before they may even know it.

[Narrator]

There are many others who played a role in Kelly's survival. The firefighters, paramedics, nurses and doctors. For his part, when looking back at the whole ordeal, David's main feeling is one of gratitude and appreciation for a community who rallied around when they most needed it.

[David Dwyer]

There's just so many beautiful people. The woman who cleaned the room every day came in and dusted. And Mark found out that Kelly and I, whenever we're together, we have tea and toast. Every morning together, we make tea. We have toast with peanut butter on it. We sit, we talk, and we have tea and toast. And this beautiful, beautiful person who comes into the room every morning quietly and just cleans the room and disappears started showing up every morning with two cups of tea and two pieces of toast with peanut butter on it for Kelly and I. She knew Kelly was in a coma. She knew Kelly's not going to drink that tea or eat that toast. But she brought this normalcy to this awful situation. She just showed up every day. And the nurses, the wonderful people, family, medical staff, everybody. I look back at that just saying how wonderful people were.

[Kelly Dwyer]

This is not a story about me. This is a story about the never give up spirit of a community and of a family and of people that are there to take care of each other. Nobody ever gave up on me. That's what the story is about. It's not me surviving this. I survived it because of the community and all members of my community. And that's a really wide net that I cast. Never gave up on me. And we don't give up on each other. We shouldn't.

[Narrator]

Next time on Real survival stories. We meet 24 year old park ranger Andy Peterson on April 30, 1998, Andy wakes up late. He decides to put off his list of chores and instead heads to Colorado's Roxburgh national park for an invigorating hike. It's a decision that will change his life forever. On the forested slopes of Carpenter's Peak, Andy is stalked and then attacked by an apex predator that seems intent on ending his life. Hunted, isolated and terrified, it appears certain that he will become the beast's next meal. That's next time on real Survival Stories. Listen right now without waiting and without ads, by joining noiserplus.