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Charlie Dickman and his family have vacationed in Puerto Rico several times within the past decade, but none may have been as memorable as their last in December.

Dickman, of Thornton, was on the beach with his wife, Janna, and their three children when he saw a man’s body floating in the water.

“I instantly thought it was a shark attack,” he said.

Dickman told his wife to stay with their children on the beach, and he ran to the man in the water without giving it much thought.

The man’s mouth and eyes were wide open and he wasn’t breathing, so Dickman, 38, carried him to the beach, where he performed CPR on him. Having never done CPR before, he relied on what he’d seen on TV and his wife, who works at MercyOne.

After 20 minutes, the man’s heart fluttered and he started breathing.

“You only feel that (adrenaline rush) a couple times in your life,” Dickman said. “That emotion is crazy.”

The man, Richard Snider, of Fairfax, Virginia, was transported by an ambulance to a nearby emergency room.