As the men drove through the West Park Subdivision in Cary, they noticed two young girls, ages 9 and 11, in the middle of a pond. They said one girl was on the cement trying to pull the other out of the frigid water.
"She couldn't because the water was wearing her down with all the clothes she had on," sanitation worker Drew Dixon said.
Dixon tried to use a sled to pull them out, but it did not work. Sanitation worker James Lyons' first instinct was to jump in.
"I figured it was not that far; I could swim," Lyons said.
Said Dixon: "I told him that wasn't the best thing to do. Plus, it was thin ice.
"My past military (training) just came to me," Dixon said, "and I thought I could tie everything together and pull them in."
Dixon and another man later took off their belts and tied them to the sled. As Dixon was trying to push the sled out to the girls, he ended up sliding down a little hill and broke through the ice.
One-by-one, the girls were reeled in. The sanitation crew members, who did not even know the girls' names, later left the pond to continue their route.
One of the girl's parents called the town of Cary to express sincere thanks to the workers. The girls' names have not been released.
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