Officers Alexander Lopez & Andrew Soderlund of Aurora and Yorkville respectively are the Law Enforcement Heroes.
The day before Thanksgiving 2022, Officer Alexander Lopez and Field Training Officer Andrew Soderlund of the Aurora Police Department were working in different patrol cars when a call came in that woman and a nine-year-old child had fallen through the ice on a nearby retention pond. The child had been playing with a football that landed on the ice and when he tried to retrieve it, he fell through. The woman saw the incident and tried to save him. The officers raced to the scene with Officer Lopez arriving first. He waded into the retention pond and began to chip away at the ice to rescue the individuals. Eventually the water became too deep for him to touch the bottom, so he swam out in the frigid waters, and proceeded to take hold of both the boy and the woman and tried to swim with both clinging to his back. This proved extremely difficult so Officer Soderlund ran into the water with a rope tied to himself so that their colleagues on shore could help pull them in and get the woman and the boy out of the water. After they were out of the water, Officers Lopez, Soderlund and those rescued were treated for hypothermia, but all made a full recovery.
Read more about the 2023 American Red Cross of Greater Chicago’s Red Cross Heroes and how you can join us in making a difference.
