Trio honored for saving lives during tsunami

The sky and water were crystal clear, a stunning shade of aquamarine. Boats of all shapes and sizes dotted the calm water. Parents chatted nearby while children giggled and romped on the beach. Tourists and residents intermingled in the sun and in hotels and restaurants along the waterfront. It was a beautiful day.

Then the first wave hit.

Julie Sobolewski, her son Casey, and their family friend John Henke, were on their chartered 35-foot sailboat about one-half mile from shore in Phuket, Thailand, on December 26, 2004, when the tsunami hit.

The first wave was an estimated 40 feet high, and was traveling at about 500 mph when it struck. They were able to turn their boat into the wave and survive, but the surrounding devastation was apparent immediately. Mothers and children were screaming and crying, and fishermen were tossed into the sea when their long-tail boats were shattered by the force of the water.

“When I saw the wave, I knew the fishermen weren’t going to outrun it,” Julie Sobolewski says. “I felt so hopeless. I thought there was no way. It was almost like slow motion.”

The Sobolewskis and Henke immediately sprang into action. They turned the boat and scooped up fishermen who were bobbing in the deep water. “After the first wave passed, I remember there was no discussion among the three of us, we all just started throwing ropes into the water to help,” Julie Sobolewski says. “It wasn’t a thinking thing; it was a doing thing.”

Casey Sobolewski took the dinghy from behind the 35-foot sailboat and headed toward a nearby cliff, where some people had been thrown by the wave. The three spent six hours rescuing about 50 victims. They recorded some of the dramatic rescues with their cameras.

It didn’t take long for word to get out back home in the United States that not only did the Sobolewskis and Henke survive the tsunami, but they were heroes for saving many lives that day. Local television stations—and national networks—picked up their story. Members of the Kiwanis Club of Oceanside Pacific caught word of the news about the local residents.

“I became aware of their experience while watching television,” says Bill Foran, an Oceanside Pacific Kiwanian. “I called Julie and met her and her son Casey to see if what I had heard was factual. Boy, was it!”

Bill’s Kiwanis club nominated the Sobolewskis and Henke for the Robert P. Connelly Medal for Heroism. This past July, the Kiwanis International Foundation Board chose the three to receive the award.

“Bill Foran came out and talked to me and my son and told us he wanted to nominate us for the Connelly Medal,” Julie Sobolewski says. “How did it make me feel? To be honest, we’ve had so much publicity, we’ve done so much TV and interviewing, it kind of became overwhelming. We didn’t feel like heroes at all. We did what we hoped anyone would do. It was almost embarrassing to hear that word used.”