Jackie Stefaniuk from Cochrane is still amazed by the response she's received after rescuing a dog from the Kananaskis River while paddle boarding this summer.
The dramatic rescue was caught on video on Aug. 11 by onlookers after Stefaniuk had just completed a downriver race at KanFest.
"At that point, I was just doing laps on a cartwheel corner, a nice little drop. that's where I was showing off to my husband." explains Stefaniuk with a laugh. "He never really gets to see me do that kind of stuff. And I was just standing on the shore getting ready to do another lap, and this woman came up to me, tapped me on the shoulder and said. 'Excuse me, I don't know your skill level, but there's a dog trapped in the eddy over there by that cliff, do you think you can help?"
Stefaniuk, who is a highly skilled paddler, sprung into action to save the dog.
"To be paddling in those conditions, I've invested pretty heavily in my training. I've taken swift water rescue, I've taken first aid and back wilderness first aid, and training like skill development to purposely become a skilled paddler."
She says the dog wanted nothing to do with her when she approached him in the icy waters.
"Finally I just had to just haul him onto my board, he was a medium sized dog, and then I just had to calm him down, because he was frantic and he was just beside himself."
Stefaniuk was able to calm the dog down by wrapping her arms and legs around him.
She then paddled towards a nearby kayaker and released the dog to shore.
"The dog jumped into the water and ran up the cliff. You know how most dogs, when they get out of the water, the first thing that they do is stop and shake, well he just hit the shore, and he was gone up the mountain and back to his people."
The video of the rescue was posted to social media shortly after and Stefaniuk says she's been flooded with messages of gratitude since.
"It's been pretty cool, actually, because, as you said, I continued on down. I went and joined my friends, did a little more paddling, mentioned it to a couple people that I saved a dog and they were like, 'Oh, that's cool. That's really great Jackie, good job.' And that was it, no big deal."
"I guess the volume of gratitude that people have out there for, in my mind, all I did was save a dog. But, I get it, but I wasn't expecting the outpouring of, you know, Yay. Cheers. Way to go. So that was kind of neat."