On the ropes

Jory Thomas is my kind of kid...he's not sitting around playing computer games and making fakey Ticky-Tocks all night.

As young men did in my day, 14-year-old Jory, from out of Big Timber, Montana, spends his time perfecting his lassoing skills.

And that came in handy not long ago when Jory and his family were camping out along the Yellowstone River, and Jory saw a small boat and paddleboard that had gone under after hitting a bridge.

Three of the boaters were paddling toward shore, but a fourth was clinging to a gray cooler and drifting away. 

Jory's father called 911 while Jory grabbed his lariat. (Spanish for rope is "la riata," so that's where we came up with lariat for lasso.)

Jory ran across the riverbank and into the chest-deep water. Ten feet from the helpless man, he circled the lariat loop in the air and threw it toward the victim...

And all that practice paid off. He lassoed the man around the head and arm on his first try!

 

As if he had roped a prize steer, Jory tied his end of the lasso to his belt buckle and walked ten feet backward, pulling the man to shore.

And by the time first responders got there, the man was safe on shore.

“It’s a really good possibility that search and rescue would’ve been looking for a body by that time,” Sweet Grass County Sheriff Alan Ronneberg said.

No one was badly injured, and Jory is home now getting ready for ninth grade.

So please, everyone, encourage your children to learn basic water rescue skills. The only way Jory could have been cooler with this would have been to do the whole rescue on horseback!

Jory learned his roping skills as he and his brothers took turns snaring each other's legs on their ranch.

Perhaps I shouldn't have said that part. Don't tell your kids.