The colleagues were returning to Cardiff from an ambulance call out when they were stopped and asked to rescue an elderly woman from her house, which was surrounded by rising and fast flowing water.

After tying a rope to their ambulance, the pair struggled through chest high water, buffeted by a strong current, to get to the house.

At one point Mr Qvist placed 80-year-old Pauline Eichman on his shoulders to carry her through the water, struggling to keep upright.

Just when he thought he had Mrs Eichman on solid ground, Mr Qvist was walking back over a road bridge when a sink hole developed, he said.

The bridge collapsed, dropping him several metres into the rushing water below.

"We got separated and I got trapped under the pier and I thought I was drowning because I couldn't free myself," Mr Qvist said.

"And then the patient went by and I grabbed her and she broke the suction, otherwise she would have been heading out to the lake."

Mr Hardes helped pull them both to safety.

Mr Qvist broke his ankle in the fall, but managed to drive Mrs Eichman to hospital.

Both men have received commendations for brave conduct.