Give Lifeguards Higher Regard as a Vital Service

Calendar summer doesn’t begin until June 21. But with the death of a 19-year-old Navy corpsman off Black’s Beach on April 20, the season for drowning has begun.

It could be a long, grim season if the report from Charles Chase, supervisor of the Life Guard Service at Silver Strand State Beach, is any indication. Last year, the total rescues at Silver Strand were 191, he said. This year, during nine days at Easter, there were 133 rescues. That may portend a dramatic, summer-long increase in activity countywide.

Winter storm waves have carved out more holes on beach floors that could increase the potential for strong rip currents, with the greater danger that unwary swimmers, especially children, can unexpectedly find themselves in water over their heads.

With the dark clouds of terrorism detouring many tourists from foreign travel, it stands to reason that this year more travelers than usual will swell the throngs at our beaches. This will cause unusual stress on those who guard swimmers’ lives along San Diego County’s coast from San Onofre to Imperial Beach.

Rule One for swimmers has long been: Always swim where you can see a lifeguard because that means he can see you, too. But, sad to say, on many of our beaches, lifeguards can’t be seen because they aren’t there. And if you should see a swimmer in trouble, you can’t even call for help.

San Diego County has 72 miles of tempting beaches and derives much of its revenue from tourism, but the prevalent casual attitude toward lifeguarding borders on criminal negligence. The law deals harshly with a private householder who maintains what is termed an “attractive nuisance” and doesn’t provide warning and protection for unsuspecting souls who might unwittingly be lured into danger by that attraction. (For example, the unfenced swimming pool.) Yet we urge visitors to come here, using our beaches as a main enticement.

That the lifeguards aren’t regarded as an integral part of our safety services countywide, along with police, sheriffs, firefighters and ambulances, is incomprehensible. That they are not hooked directly into our 911 phone system for emergency calls is a scandal.

As it stands now, for most of the coast, if you dial 911 for a lifeguard, you’ll more likely get a firefighter or police officer--who may or may not have quick access to a lifeguard near you.

The availability of lifeguards varies among the assorted city, county and state park beaches. The City of San Diego has 24-hour lifeguard coverage, with sophisticated equipment, inflatable high-speed rescue boats and easy access to the 911 system.

Border Park State Beach, among the most dangerous, has no lifeguards.

Imperial Beach, with the most impoverished city budget in the county and a potentially very dangerous beach, struggles to provide lifeguards as best it can to cover the most crowded hours. Imperial Beach lifeguards must also watch over the overflow crowds from Silver Strand State Beach when the 1,000 parking spaces there are full.

Those who don’t live near the problem won’t feel as acutely about it as those who have gone through those prayerful watches during rescues, and then the agony of seeing a drowned person lying lifeless on the sand.

County Supervisor Susan Golding has said she supports the idea that lifeguarding should be part of the emergency rescue system and the 911 network. Now all she has to do is find a way to push that belief into action in the California Legislature.

To make it possible for a panicky private citizen to dial 911 and be routed directly to the nearest lifeguard station, some additional equipment would be required, such as monitoring screens and other electronic devices. You’re already paying toward that through a surcharge on your monthly telephone statement that goes to underwrite the 911 system. According to B. Chris Brewster, president of the San Diego Lifesaving Assn., just a few words could change existing law to make that funding include lifeguards.

The law now covers police, sheriffs, firefighters, emergency ambulance service, poison control and suicide prevention. The proposed wording would also state, “Any system such as the 911 emergency call system which serves a coastal area shall include any available marine safety service, such as lifeguards, harbor police and harbor patrol.”

Inadequate budgeting isn’t the only reason for lack of urgency in hooking our lifeguard agencies directly into the 911 network. There is a mistaken perception that a crisis calling for a lifeguard lasts only a few minutes. But a variety of prolonged coastal crises can occur, among them cliff rescues and boating emergencies where the help of a lifeguard could make the crucial difference.

In April, 1984, when 19-year-old Gary Decker’s surfboard leash became entangled in the rope of a lobster trap buoy off Imperial Beach, he fought to stay alive for 50 minutes. He could have won, if lifeguards had occupied a higher priority and if there had been direct communication with lifeguards.

We need more public awareness and more indignation. Nobody can do everything, but everybody can do something. Form your own local Friends of Lifeguards Assn. Raise funds for equipment such as hand-held shortwave radios. Raise your voice at budget sessions at town councils, at the county Board of Supervisors meetings, at the Legislature.

Insist that lifeguards be given a higher regard in our year-round scheme of things and that more and better warning signs be posted along dangerous beaches--signs with easily understood graphics for those who don’t read English.

For a sad but undeniable symbol of the low place lifeguards occupy in public policy throughout the county, take a look at your phone book.

On the inside cover in three-inch red letters is the number 911. Nowhere on that page will you find the word lifeguard.

For now, if you witness an aquatic emergency and look for a way to call for help, you won’t find lifeguards listed among emergency rescue agencies. You might find them listed under some cities, if you have time to search.

Until we get a change in attitude and a change in law, you could be on your own. In the phone book, the Survival Guide is in the white pages starting on A-55.

Drowning is on Page A-58.