Chicago surgeon dies saving two drowning boys

(CBS News) LAKESIDE, Mich. - A Chicago surgeon who dedicated his life to saving the lives of children died Sunday as he tried to rescue two young boys in Lake Michigan.

Dr. Donald Liu, 50, was spending the weekend at the lake with his wife and three children when, from the beach, he saw two young boys struggling in the water, CBS Chicago station WBBN reports.

The surgeon got the boys to safety, but he never made it back to land as he was pulled under by the rip current.

Colleagues described Liu as a brilliant doctor. He was the chief surgeon at the University of Chicago's Comer Children's Hospital and was an internationally known expert in pediatric minimally invasive surgery.

"Don's death personifies a life that was devoted to saving children," said Dr. Kenneth S. Polonsky, dean of the University of Chicago's Medical School, in an e-mail published by the Sun-Times Media Wire.