NORTH TEXAS — A 21-year-old man died tragically lost his life trying to save a drowning young girl.

The girl, who belonged to a church group, survived thanks to the help of a boatman who immediately intervened to save her before trying to rescue the young man.

“I don’t know what to feel, it was pretty crazy, even when I got back here it felt like nothing ever happened, you know,” said Jacob Bell of Red Oak.

Bell is still trying to understand what happened Saturday on Lake Waxahachie while he was out fishing on his boat with his friend Craig McDonald.

They were just finishing up their evening work and bringing the boat to the dock when they heard screams.

“He (Bell) slowly comes towards me and then he starts screaming,” said Craig McDonald.

In the distance, Bell saw what he thought was a young girl treading water.

“As I got closer to her in the motorboat, the little girl – I may be wrong, but it looked like I had a life jacket on one arm and on the other girl’s leg – was floating under the water and I pulled her up,” Bell said.

“I don’t know how he did it,” McDonald said. “The boat has a two-foot gap between the side and the water and somehow he caught the girl and lifted her up.”

He began life-saving CPR. Amazingly, he had just been retrained in CPR for his job. The girl started breathing again when…

“Suddenly the screaming is even louder, and I mean it’s bloodcurdling screaming,” McDonald said.

At that moment, Bell realized that a young man who had jumped into the water to save the drowning girl was now also drowning.

“I ran from where the boat was, across the rocks down there, jumped in, dived under and swam down about four or five times until I found the boy, picked him up and gave him a slap,” Bell said.

The 21-year-old man was pronounced dead at the hospital. Bell wishes he had gotten there sooner, but he believes his own family’s painful history of drowning deaths gave him the strength to act immediately.

“When I was 12, my little brother, Chase Ryan Bell, died from drowning,” Bell said. “He died when I was 12, so being water safe and looking out for people has always been a part of our family.”

They hope this tragedy can lead to change. They believe that without a designated swimming area, more people could be injured here.

“All it takes is a buoy area on a string so they know where they can and can’t swim, because that’s where dangerous boats come in and out,” Bell said.

“The way the pier and swimming area are designed at Lake Waxahachie will be repeated,” McDonald said.

While most would call Bell a hero…

“He definitely deserves a cape, I mean, the guy is a superhero,” McDonald said.

“I don’t want to be seen as a hero. I mean, I’m proud of myself, don’t get me wrong,” Bell said. “And I wasn’t always like this. I wasn’t always a good person. So it’s very good for my soul to be able to do this.”

Bell says the credit should go to two others.

“The boy was a hero and I want his family to understand that,” Bell said. “And the little girl that kept that little girl alive, that girl saved that little girl’s life… I hope anybody would have done what I did.”