A tourist vacationing on the island rescued a struggling snorkeller on Wednesday, pulling him from the waters of Church Bay — with his GoPro camera recording the entire incident.

Speaking to The Royal Gazette yesterday, Brett Gibson, from Middletown, Connecticut, said he acted on instinct upon hearing cries for help.

“I don’t remember thinking anything,” he said. “All of a sudden I was just in the water swimming to where they were.”

Mr Gibson had arrived on the island with his fiancée, Hope Klausen, that same day on board the Norwegian Dawn and decided to make Church Bay their first stop.

Not long after getting into the water, however, he said he and his friend Nick Chmura heard two men farther out calling for assistance.

“When we got to the men one looked exhausted, the other looked very pale and even grey,” he said. “His chest was scraped up pretty bad and he looked swollen. He was floating on his back and seemed very out of it.

“The man floating on his back quickly became the priority. We each took an arm and began swimming back to shore with him. When we got to standing height in the water we had to clamber over numerous rocks trying to keep our balance and keep the man’s face out of the water.

“At one point Nick slipped on a rock falling away briefly and I slung the man’s arm over my shoulder and carried his weight alone until Nick made it back to where I was carrying him.”

As soon as they got to shore they were met by one of the men’s wives among other bystanders, who helped the pair bring the men out of the water.

“People on the beach tended to the man, held a towel over him for shade, and propped him up on his side,” he said. “A local on the beach had called for the ambulance which was now on the way.

“I didn’t think about either mine nor Nick’s safety. I think we both acted on instinct.”

The man pulled from the water was subsequently taken to King Edward VII Memorial Hospital for treatment and later released.

“It turns out the man and the group he was with were all from our cruise,” Mr Gibson said. “Afterwards, both men and their wives found us on the ship one day and thanked us both.

“They had snorkelled out too far. The man who we dragged ashore ingested salt water when he accidentally dunked his breathing tube under water. After that, a wave came up over his head and he breathed in even more.

“His friend swam him towards shore until he was in shouting distance of us. He made it ashore by himself.”

Mr Gibson said he had no idea that his camera had recorded the rescue until around an hour after the fact as he was packing up to leave the beach.

“In the beginning of the video I was trying to catch footage around the rock I was standing on,” he said. “After we heard the call for help I kind of forgot it was attached to my wrist.

“I think the footage is pretty remarkable. It obviously doesn’t catch the best angles of the action, but it certainly captures the moment.”