St Albans: Autistic girl's favourite toy saved by heroic park staff

Julia Spanswick cares for Amelia,12, who has severe special needs and is nonverbal.

On a visit to the park in late July, Julia and Amelia were playing hide and seek when she dropped her favourite toy - a puppet of Sooty from popular children's programme 'Sooty and Sweep' - from the bridge into the lake below.

Amelia was desperate to recover her prized possession. (Image: Julia Spanswick) Amelia explains: "She wanted him back but couldn't quite understand why we couldn't just recover him.

"I thought 'oh my gosh, that's it he's gone now' while she kept pointing to the lake and making noise."

After heading down to the lake they found that Sweep was stuck in the lake, submerged in water.

The first act of kindness came from an elderly couple who told them that there is a park keeper who could potentially help.

They headed to the Grebe House Wildlife Garden, where Julia says that Amelia was "very curious about the whole thing, trying to explore the office".

She says that staff there interacted with Amelia "beautifully" after it was explained that she was nonverbal - something that "isn't always the case".

Staff called park keeper Robin, who came out to help.

From there, things started to look up, as Julia explains: "Robin trampled down through all the stinging nettles with his rod and net and he went all-out, above and beyond to try and rescue Sweep.

Intrepid park keeper Robin led the search for Sweep. (Image: Julia Spanswick) "By this time we had a bit of a crowd gathering to see what's going on.

"Eventually, he scooped her out of the water and a great big cheer went up!

"Amelia was signing that she wanted to give him a kiss - I said 'absolutely not', as he was filthy!"

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In a scene reminiscent of 'The Lion King', Julia held the rescued puppet up to the gathered crowd to signal that the rescue had been successful.

Amelia with her family. (Image: Julia Spanswick) Reflecting on that day, she said: ""All the staff at the park were so kind and I just want to recognise their kindness and how amazing it was that everyone went above and beyond for Amelia.

"Jo and the team at Grebe House were so wonderful and I want that to be recognised and appreciated."

The team have even invited Julia and Amelia (and Sweep!) to return to the park for a free guided wildlife tour and lunch - an offer they are keen to accept!