A 25-year-old Queens woman yesterday recounted the horror of watching her young husband being pulled out to sea at Jones Beach in an ill-fated attempt to rescue her from a rip current.

"The water was like the devil. The devil was pulling us in [deeper]," Delia Balkaran said of the tide that overtook her husband, Narie, 22, who died Monday evening along Field 6, which has no lifeguard protection.

Rescuers failed in a desperate attempt to revive the young father.

Balkaran's death was a nightmare ending to what began as a fun beach outing with his wife and 23-month-old daughter, Daniella.

The couple was frolicking in waist-deep water, surrounded by other swimmers, unaware of the dangerous currents around them.

"He was splashing me, trying to get me wet. I told him 'No, it's cold,' " Delia said in a tearful interview at the family's Richmond Hill home. "He was happy."

That changed in a heartbeat, when a riptide yanked the couple away from safety.

"We were playing in the water, and the water started pulling us into the ocean," Balkaran said. "The sand was giving way at our feet."

Her husband tried to ease her fears. "He told me to swim, and suddenly a wave came over us and pulled us in more," Balkaran remembered.

"I got tired swimming and I told him, 'I can't do it anymore.' He looked at me and said, 'It's going to be OK.' And he pushed me.

"He held my hand, but the tide pulled us in some more . . . I tried to scream for help. People were yelling, 'Hold on!' "

Somehow -- she believes with her husband's help -- Balkaran made it back toward the beach.

But Narie Balkaran, a strong swimmer who, like his wife, grew up on the island of Trinidad, had no chance against the Jones Beach riptide.

"When I looked back, he was going," his wife said, choking up with tears. "He's my hero. He sacrificed his life for me."

Authorities said the couple was a half mile from Jones Beach's designated swimming area, where lifeguards were on duty.

When they learned the Balkarans were endangered, one lifeguard ran the half-mile to the scene, officials said.

He and several others worked to pull Narie Balkaran to the beach.

Delia Balkaran helplessly watched her husband's body twitching as the lifeguards performed CPR, before putting him on a stretcher and taking him to the hospital.

"They did the best they could," Balkaran said.

Her husband was pronounced dead at 8 p.m.

Balkaran is a stay-at-home mom. Her husband worked in his family's construction business.

Balkaran recalled a now-heartbreaking moment from Saturday night, when they looked into each other's eyes and he asked her how much she loved him.

"With all my heart," she answered.

Their daughter is asking for her daddy. Delia Balkaran is planning his funeral.



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