That was the only recollection of former Dunedin woman Naomi Dunning (nee Dixon) of the moment she hitched up her wedding dress and leapt in to action to help save a woman from drowing last weekend.
Mrs Dunning (31), who grew up in Dunedin and graduated from the Otago Polytechnic nursing school in 2004, has lived in Adelaide since 2005.
Her parents, Graeme and Alison Dixon, live in St Leonards.
She and Australian husband Josh (30) had just arrived with their wedding party at Glenelg beach, in Adelaide, South Australia, for formal photos, when groomsman Adrian Harvie jumped into the water. He had spied a woman floating in 30cm-deep water underneath the 2m-high jetty.
Mr Dunning was hard on his heels and the two men carried the badly injured woman, who appeared to have fallen off the jetty, to the beach.
Mrs Dunning, an emergency nurse who is on maternity leave, said she could barely remember what happened next, but instinct must have kicked in.
The mother of two started mouth-to-mouth resuscitation, while the wedding photographer, Donna Solowij, a nursing colleague on her first wedding shoot, put down her camera and performed chest compressions.
The pair worked for five minutes on the 55-year-old woman, who they later learned had suffered broken ribs, a broken arm and had broken her back in three places, until emergency services arrived.
Fifteen minutes later, the couple's 68 guests arrived at the beach, in time for two surprises - first, the wedding party had been caught up in the rescue drama, and then, Mr and Mrs Dunning were already married.
"We actually eloped in October. It was going to be a surprise and we were just going to have the reception," Mrs Dunning said.
After drying their outfits with hair-dryers at a nearby hotel, the couple and their groomsman rejoined the reception to a resounding cheer.
"Everyone was really good. People kept telling us it could only have happened to us."
And the high spirits continued, even when, an hour into the reception, security guards escorted the couple outside to give statements to police officers.
The rescue made an Adelaide newspaper on Monday and since then, the couple have featured in local and national newspapers and on state and national television in Australia.
"We are both a bit mortified. We just wanted to have something small and quiet, but we failed miserably, I think."
Mrs Dunning said she visited the woman in hospital on Wednesday.
"She is stable and doing well, and the doctors say she will have a full recovery."
