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Maui firefighters rescue boy, father from swollen stream

Maui firefighters rescued an 11-year-old boy swept away by fast-flowing Iao stream waters, and his father who went into the river to rescue him today.

Firefighters arriving on scene at about 3:30 p.m. found a young boy and a man stranded on an island in the middle of the stream.

Bystanders were attempting to rescue them with a garden hose thrown to them from a stream bank near the Sack-n-Save in Paukukalo.

Firefighters told the man and boy to stay put until the Fire Department helicopter arrived.

The helicopter took the boy and his father to a landing zone on the mauka side of Waiehu Beach Road, where paramedics treated the boy for minor abrasions.

The boy was playing in the river with his older sister in a calmer part of the stream and tried to recover a boogie board that was floating away when he was swept downstream by the fast-flowing water, a Fire Department spokesman said.

When his sister ran home and brought their father back, he entered the stream and walked out to the island.

Two engine companies and rescue crews from Wailuku and Kahului responded to the incident.

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