The incident occurred in the evening, when temperatures had already dropped below freezing. An employee of MOSiR in Lubań went outside and heard someone trying to get out of the river. The man was trying to climb out, but unsuccessfully—he kept landing back in the icy water.
According to eluban.pl:
Seeing that he was unable to help on his own, the employee immediately called the emergency services. A short while later, firefighters and police officers arrived at the scene and jointly pulled the hypothermic man out of the water.
The man was barefoot. The uniformed officers provided him with first aid, after which he was handed over to medical rescuers. The latter praised the MOSiR employee's actions, emphasizing that the man would not have been able to get out of the river on his own—and would not have survived for more than two hours.