Brent Slough, a former Army Ranger and West Point grad, remains in a Miami ICU as his family prays for healing and justice. The boaters who fled are still at large.
DALLAS, Texas — A family from Prosper, Texas, says their dream vacation to the Bahamas turned into a nightmare when a boat struck a former Army Ranger while he was snorkeling, and never stopped.
Now, as he recovers in a Miami ICU, his family is leaning on faith and calling for the boaters to be brought to justice.
“It’s such a beautiful place,” Whitney Slough, Brent Slough’s wife, said of the Bahamas. “But I feel like I’m in a nightmare.”
On June 30, the Sloughs were enjoying the clear waters near the shores of Exuma when, according to Whitney, “this boat came out of nowhere — and never stopped.”
“They know they hit him, they saw him snorkeling,” she said. “And they drove off. I just can’t let that be.”
Brent, a West Point graduate and former Army Ranger who served 6 years in the military and one tour in Iraq, had been snorkeling before dinner when a boat skimming the shallows struck him, slicing into his lower body.
“The propeller hit him right underneath the buttocks and the legs and just sliced him there,” Whitney said.
She recalled hearing his cries from the water: “We hear Brent screaming, ‘Help me, help me, help me.’ We didn’t realize that he was struck by the boat.”
Whitney, her family, friends, and good Samaritans rushed to pull Brent from the water and wrapped him in towels to try to stop the bleeding. They took him to a nearby hospital themselves before paying out of pocket to fly him back to the U.S. a day later, where he remains in an ICU in Miami.
“They whisked him away to surgery right away,” Whitney said.
Doctors operated on him for four hours; he sustained a fractured pelvis and leg. Slough’s wife told WFAA that the doctors can’t stitch his wounds because they’re so deep and have been packing them instead.
She told WFAA she or her daughters would have been dead if they had traded places with their father.
“He knows God kept him alive for a reason, and he has a purpose here, and it’s bigger than us,” Whitney said.
As Brent recovers in the hospital, Bahamian authorities are searching for the boat and crew responsible. The Slough family says they’re leaning on their faith as they wait for answers.
“We’re lucky that he’s alive,” Whitney said. “And there’s no way that they should be able to get away with this.”
In the family’s prayers, she said, they ask for healing, and that the boaters who vanished won’t stay hidden forever.
The Sloughs are now raising money to pay for medical bills. If you’d like to donate, go here.
