Not all heroes wear capes. Some of them are just regular people who are in the right place at the right time and have a sense of duty to help others. Lio Cundiff, who lives in Chicago, is being hailed as a hero after rescuing an 8-month-old baby from the freezing waters of Lake Michigan. The combination of warm weather and strong winds off the lake led to a perfect storm of air that landed the baby in the water. Cundiff did what we hope most people would do: put himself in danger to make sure that the little girl didn’t die. Even though he doesn’t think he’s a hero, I don’t think anyone would call him anything else.
According to Chicago police, a gust of wind blew the baby girl, who was strapped into her stroller, into the water at Belmont Harbor around 3 p.m. February 18, 2026, WLS reported. Multiple witnesses immediately rushed over to help rescue the little one.
“I see a stroller getting blown into the lake … and a lady screaming,” Cundiff told the outlet from his hospital bed hours after the rescue. The woman was clearly distraught, and even though Cundiff can’t swim, he knew he had to help.
“I can tell she was too panicked to do anything, so I was, like, ‘I guess I’m jumping in,’” he said. “That baby was – I wasn’t going to let that baby die. That’s crazy.”
He told WLS, “I’m just glad the stroller was up, not face down. The baby dipped under a couple times, but I was able to keep her up. And she was breathing and crying when we got her out.”
The little girl was taken to Lurie Children’s Hospital for observation and was initially listed in good condition, according to the Chicago Police Department, per WLS.
Louis Kapost, who was also at the scene when the accident took place, told WMAQ the “wind just picked up and the stroller just blew right into the lake.”
As Cundiff jumped into the water, Kapost used his jacket to keep the other man tethered to something safe. It took “a bunch” of bystanders to help get Cundiff out of the water, he said. “It’s a good thing the life ring was there.”
Kapost, an American Airlines pilot, told the Chicago-Sun Times that his job has given him the training to stay calm in high stress situations. “In my line of work, we’re taught when you rush, that’s when you tend to make mistakes that can eventually lead to disaster. So that was kind of my focus. Be methodical, take your time, think everything through.
“It’s a small baby. I think everyone in the city would’ve jumped into the lake if it took us all jumping in there to get her out,” he told the newspaper.
Cundiff praised Kapost for the ways he helped during the rescue. “Him throwing that jacket down helped me so much,” he said, per the Sun-Times. “I did not know how long I was gonna be able to keep either of us afloat.”
In turn, Kapost called out Cundiff for his heroic efforts. “That’s the epitome of a hero, someone who’s going to act, to help somebody else they don’t know even though they’re placing their own life in danger,” he told the newspaper.
Cundiff, a server and standup comedian, had well-wishes for the little girl he helped save. “I hope she has a really cool future, and I’m happy I was there,” he told WLS.
