In August, Syrian Sarah and Ysra Mardini swam for three hours from Turkey to the Greek island of Lesvos seeking asylum.

According to an AP report, the Mardini sisters were swimming stars in Syrian, but the war forced them to leave Syria and seek refuge in Europe. They left Damascus in early August, traveled to Lebanon and from there to Turkey paying smugglers to get them to Greece.

They got on an inflatable boat with many other refugees, but thirty minutes into the journey, the boat started taking on water.

The desperate passengers started throwing their belongings in the sea to make the dinghy lighter. Ysra, Sarah and three others who were good at swimming jumped into the water and hung from the ropes to save the rest of the passengers who couldn’t swim.

“I was not afraid of dying, because if anything happened I could swim to arrive at the island. But the problem was that I had 20 people with me,” Sarah told AP. “In Syria I worked in a swimming pool as a lifeguard, so if I let anyone drown or die I would not forgive myself.”

For three hours they were swimming until the boat reached the shores of Lesvos island. There they met the kindness of strangers and others who robbed them.

Eventually they reached Berlin and a local charity organization put them in touch with a swimming club, where they were welcomed and now they train on a daily basis.