Shavarsh Karapetyan

On September 16, 1976, in Yerevan fell into the water trolley rides on the dike. Ninety-two passengers were buried alive in the ten-depth. All of them were doomed to inevitable death, if not for one thing: it is the time along the lake made training run multiple world champion in diving Shavarsh Karapetyan.

Consequently, experts admit that no one in the world just physically could not have done what he did then Shavarsh. Diving into the turbid water fall trolley, he smashed the rear window of his feet, and began to pull blacking passengers. More than twenty minutes in the icy water. Twenty lives saved. In fact, he pulled out of the trolley and more people, but not all were rescued. When Shavarsh once again come to the surface, crowding on the dam passersby saw that his body lacerated by shrapnel broken window.

Then, the question - what was then the worst? - Shavarsh said: "I knew that, despite all my training, I would last only for a certain number of dives. There at the bottom of the visibility was zero, so I snapped a human touch in his arms and swam with him upstairs. One time I surfaced and saw that in my hand ... leather cushion of the seat. I looked at her and realized that the price of my mistake - someone's life. This pillow is then not just at night I dreamed ».

A day later Shavarsh Karapetyan was taken to hospital. He thought that everything would cost, but not unlimited powers of man. Shavarsh seriously ill with pneumonia, which was complicated by sepsis. Temperature for a long time did not fall below 40 degrees. Only on the 46th day of the athlete regained consciousness, although doctors were preparing for the worst relatives. Pneumonia led to the formation of adhesions, and each athlete was given a deep breath with difficulty. About the sport could be forgotten, but Shavarsh about it and did not want to think.

In 1977 Shavarsh again became European champion, champion of the USSR, and set a new world record in the 400 meters (it was the third consecutive world record in this discipline on those events). But because of the effects of trauma, he was soon forced to leave the sport.

In Karapetyan three children - two daughters and a son. Since 1993 Shavarsh Karapetyan with his family lives and works in Moscow.

We can say that he killed his outstanding talent swimmer. But the gift of love to the people, he multiplied for these terrible twenty minutes repeatedly.