Officer who drowned hailed as hero.

Byline: Winston Ross The Register-Guard

BANDON - Bob McBride drove to the Bandon South Jetty on Tuesday morning, hopped out of his Jeep, trudged in cowboy boots to the grassy dune and looked out across the Pacific Ocean.

It was here, the day before, the police chief spotted a frantic mother waving him toward the 18-foot breakers. Yards from where he now stood, Russell Simpson, 52, a Bandon police officer and volunteer firefighter, had drowned in the raging shallows as he and McBride tried to rescue a 13-year-old boy they'd never met before.

On Tuesday, McBride returned to the scene. He looked up, and saw that boy standing behind a window in the vacation home his family had rented for the week, in town from Maple Valley, Wash. Zeb Leaf waved, and McBride waved back.

They already had met the night before. They shared a hospital room, where Leaf walked up to McBride and shook his hand.

"Thank you," he told him, "for risking your life to save me."

The chief broke down crying, and mumbled something back.

He'd had a long day.

`Undertow took me right out"

Monday morning began like Mondays often do in the small coastal town of Bandon, population 2,800. McBride and Simpson drove to the post office to pick up the mail, then they'd planned to "goof off" for a while - patrolling the city with the chief's black labrador, Maggie.

Meanwhile, Zeb Leaf was throwing sticks for his own dog, a golden retriever named Osa, along a scenic but narrow stretch of beach just south of the Coquille River jetty, at high tide.

Suddenly, a giant breaker roared up and crashed down upon the dog. Leaf quickly ran after him, and got tackled by another wave, wearing thick rubber boots, a leather jacket and blue jeans.

"The undertow took me right out," he said Tuesday.

Past the break, and into the open sea Leaf went, his rubber boots filled with water. Quickly he grabbed two logs - one under each arm, and yelled for help.

"I thought I was going to die," he said.

Just as McBride and Simpson left the post office, Simpson's pager went off. Leaf's mother had called 911. McBride flipped on the lights and the pair raced down to the beach.

They were the first emergency officials to arrive. The boy was just past the breakers, bobbing up and down in the water. The chief quickly donned his wet suit and tried to rush in after Leaf. Maggie the dog went in, too, with a handle-equipped harness on, in case she got close enough to the boy to let him grab on and be pulled to safety.

But the waves were too formidable. So Simpson clipped a rope to the chief and pledged his services as anchor. This time, McBride got past the first round of waves, but he was nowhere near the boy.

"The only time I could see anything is if I rolled back, and looked up at the sky," McBride said. "It was impossible to swim out there."

Luckily, a Coast Guard helicopter was minutes away when the dispatch call went out at 9:30 a.m. By the time McBride made it past the break, Leaf was already climbing into a basket dropped to him from the air. He did this without assistance, despite being in the water for what he said was 45 minutes.

Leaf survived, and so did his dog, who had swam back to shore not long after getting pulled into the waves.

But there was trouble back at the beach. Simpson and Leaf's father were struggling to hang onto McBride's line, and the chief could do little else but be reeled in like a fish. The two men on land got closer to the water, then another giant wave knocked them off their feet, washing the elder Leaf back on shore, but yanking Simpson into the sea.

As other rescuers grabbed the line and pulled McBride back in, Simpson was drowning in the breakers. Rescuers pulled him out and performed first aid.

"I look over and see them working on this guy," McBride said. "It didn't look like the victim. It looked like Russ."

Simpson was pronounced dead at Lower Coos Hospital shortly thereafter.

"I want to make sure he's remembered as a hero," McBride said. "By God, that's what he was."

On Tuesday, the Bandon Police Station was Grand Central Station, with friends and relatives stopping by to pay their respects to the fallen officer.

"If you were in trouble, Russ Simpson was there," Mayor Joe Whitsett said. "He was a sweetheart. And a hero."

It's been a trying year for this department. Earlier this summer, Sgt. Carl Nayaert died of cancer. And the chief himself was convicted on poaching charges this fall, which may lead to his state certification being pulled, and the loss of his job.

Simpson's younger brother Forrest had worked in the office right next to Russell's. On Tuesday, Forrest recalled a man who dreamed of being a firefighter since junior high school - and who saved his first life before that, even.

Their father was in the U.S. Air Force, so the family lived in several different places, including England. One summer overseas, the two brothers were playing in the ocean, when Forrest walked into a hole and sank into the water.

"Russ reached down and pulled me out," he said. "He started his lifesaving career at age 10."

A few years later, Russ fell in love with firefighting, after watching a crew battle a brush fire outside his San Diego home. He graduated high school in 1971, and after a stint in the Army during the Vietnam War, Simpson became a firefighter.

For nearly 20 years, Simpson worked at the Delmar Fire Department in California. In the mid-'90s, he retired and he and his wife, Gale, moved to Bandon, where his parents had retired and Forrest worked as a reserve officer for the department. The couple didn't have children.

It wasn't long before Russ was riding around on patrol with Forrest. Then he became a reserve officer himself, and a volunteer firefighter. He even volunteered himself as "bait" for the department's crime dog, Rex - he'd allow the dog to attack him during training sessions (with the proper padding, of course).

"He truly wasn't happy unless he was helping someone," Forrest said. "He was out on every call."

When he died, Simpson was working part time for the city as its code enforcement officer. He was also the city's safety coordinator, McBride said.

"So few of us get to choose the way we go out," said Forrest, fighting back tears. "Russ, he was in a harness. There was no other place he would want to be."

Winston Ross can be reached at [phone] or rgcoast@ oregonfast.net.

SIMPSON FUNERAL

The funeral for Russell Simpson will be held at Bandon High School at 2 p.m. on Saturday. Memorials may be sent to the Bandon Police Department, P.O. Box 67, Bandon, OR 97411.

CAPTION(S):

Steven and Dee Leaf (foreground) and their 20-year-old son (right) stand near rescuers after their 13-year-old son, Zeb, was saved by a U.S. Coast Guard helicopter in Bandon on Monday. Bandon reserve officer Russ Simpson died trying to save the boy.