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by GREG GITTRICH,
Kristin Bledsoe knew there was no time to waste yesterday when she heard two swimmers screaming for help after they were swept away by a riptide off the Rockaways.
The ex-lifeguard, who spent seven summers watching over the beach, ran up to a stranger, grabbed her boogie board and raced out to try to save the pair.
"I couldn't sit there and do nothing," said Bledsoe, 23. "I would've felt guilty if I didn't go in."
Right behind Bledsoe was off-duty firefighter Brian Sullivan, who was riding his bicycle down the boardwalk around 4 p.m. when he saw the commotion. He also dived into the surf in hopes of pulling the two young men to shore.
"All of them were in bad trouble," said Sullivan, 38, a 10-year FDNY veteran.
The pair of good Samaritans pulled up the two men and held them above the water until another wave of hero firefighters arrived to pluck everyone ashore.
One of the men rescued was in stable condition at Peninsula General Hospital last night and expected to recover. The other was in critical condition at Schneider Children's Hospital in Manhasset, L.I.
"It felt good to help," said Frank Brennan, 30, of Ladder Company 137, one of the rescuers. "I just hope the guy's okay."
The drama in the Atlantic Ocean unfolded on a balmy late-summer day when many people were off from work or school because of the Rosh Hashanah holiday.
Bledsoe, who works as a fashion designer, was catching some rays when she heard the screams off 123-11 Rockaway Beach Blvd. and sprang into action.
As others watched helplessly, she grabbed the board and paddled out perhaps 100 yards.
"I heard them yelling but I knew I couldn't go out there and grab two guys by myself," she said. "I said, 'These two kids are drowning. I need your boogie board.'"
By the time she and Sullivan reached the swimmers, one was gulping in water and the other had already gone under.
"My friend, my friend," one of the men gasped to Sullivan.
Bledsoe was treading water when her leg struck the other man beneath the waves - and they were able to pull him up.
"It was lucky he was right there," she said.
Even after the two victims were out of the water, Bledsoe and Sullivan had a tough battle on their hands. "We were pretty far out," she said. "We couldn't pull them in by ourselves."
Brennan and fellow firefighter Jim Mulvey, 34, were the first men from Ladder 137 to hit the waves because they are the strongest swimmers.
"The waves were fierce but I got out there," Brennan said.
For Bledsoe, rescues run in her blood. She grew up near the beach, and her father, Kenneth Bledsoe, is the chief lifeguard at the Rockaways. This was the first summer since she was 16 that she did not work as a lifeguard.
The older Bledsoe has seen plenty of dangerous rescues, but he was brimming with pride this time - because his daughter was the heroine.
"It's fantastic - it's hard to believe," Kenneth Bledsoe said. "The people who live out here, we know the ocean. And we know what it can do."
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