The Appelbee family, mother Joanne and three children, had set off on a sea excursion with kayaks and paddleboards near the small beach town of Quindalup in southwestern Australia. But they soon became lost in rough seas.
Forty-seven-year-old Joanne Appelbee saw no other option but to ask her eldest child to seek help.
"I told Austin, 'Try to get to shore. This could get very serious very quickly,'" she told ABC.
The boy set off in an inflatable kayak, but it broke in the waves. And the life jacket made it difficult to swim, so he ditched it.
"The waves were gigantic," the 13-year-old told the media.
Australia is home to many sharks, and he thought he saw frightening shapes in the dark water. But then he conjured up images of the Tuff-Tuff trains from the British TV series "Thomas and Friends."
"I tried to think of happy things to get through it. Not bad things that were distracting."
After four hours, he reached land, exhausted. But Western Australia is very sparsely populated, and he still needed to find a way to raise the alarm.
"I had to run two kilometers to a phone."
After ten hours in the water, the family was rescued.
"The actions of this 13-year-old boy cannot be praised highly enough," said Police Chief James Bradley.
"His determination and courage saved the lives of his mother and siblings."
