Posts

Operations

Here’s how Beach Patrol operates on a normal day:

7:15AM- “A Shift” Supervisor truck calls in service. As they patrol, they put up the appropriate colored flags at the 5 seawall locations, post the flag color and any special advisories on the website, report the rip current threat level to the National Weather Service Houston/Galveston Office. They also pick up a jet ski at our headquarters and bring it to 61st and sand in case we get emergency calls around that part of the island.

7:30AM- “A” shift lifeguards and dispatchers show up at the office. Dispatchers run through a series of morning checks while the guards run out on the beach for a 45-minute training session that includes both physical and mental practices. For example, they may swim, practice rescue board techniques, then run through hand signals or CPR.

8:00AM- Junior Lifeguards age 10 and 11 show up at either the beach or pool. They swim, have a classroom session, run out to the beach for beach exercises, come back up for class, and run back down to the water for another water session. They go back and forth from the classroom to the waterfront multiple times in their 4 hours session.

9:15AM- “A” shift guards are back from their workout, have been issued radios and flag bags, and head out to their towers. Once there they put up the two flags – one is the Beach Patrol logo and the other whatever the warning flag color of the day is. After that they check the water in their area to see where the danger spots like strong currents or holes are. They’ll do this again halfway through their shift because all can change quickly. These are more senior lifeguards, so they’ll end up doing lunch breaks once the later shift shows up at their towers. Each 4 towers is staffed by 1 “A” and 3 “C” shift guards.

11AM- “B” Shift Supervisors arrive and help patrol the beachfront since its normally getting busy and one truck isn’t enough to cover. A few guards come in this shift as well. On weekends 2 drive out west, pick up a UTV from the west end fire station and patrol the San Luis Pass.

11:45AM- “C” Shift Guards show up and go do their daily training on the beach. When they finish, some go to the towers and some stay up in Headquarters to clean before going out. When they all get out all 32 towers are covered.

1PM- Second class of Junior Guards shows up for their 4-hour session.

1:30PM- “C” shift of Supervisors shows up and, after checking trucks’ equipment, head out to cover all 6 zones. The “B” shift supervisor truck heads out to cover the 18 miles of west end.

5PM- A shift gets off work and the Junior Guards go home.

8:30PM C shift Guards off duty

9:30PM C Shift Supervisors off duty and late shift dispatchers leave

9:30PM- 7:30 AM- “On Call” Supervisor stands by to respond to emergencies.

Cold Front

Cold front after cold front have been rolling in. We are now in my favorite time of the year, with moderate temperatures, warm water, some surf, and variable conditions. But this comes with specific hazards.

Changing winds can take people by surprise. On the beachfront a switch to offshore wind can blow you offshore. Once there the waves are rougher and can prevent you from making it back in easily. Strong side-shore winds typically produce strong rip currents near any type of structure like a groin or pier. These rip currents dig deep troughs by the structure and can pull people out when they step off into the deep area. And of course, big thunderheads can roll in causing lightning, gusty wind, or even waterspouts.

The tower guards are not going to be back on the beach until March, but we do have our rescue trucks patrolling the seawall and beach parks. That said, you should be more cautious than usual and stay farther from structures and closer to shore. Also check the weather forecast before heading out to beach or bay. Be particularly careful in boats this time of year because things can happen quickly. Of course, as always, use a Coast Guard approved lifejacket while boating. If you have a small child or are a poor swimmer a lifejacket is always a good idea when in or around the water.

Our year-round crew has been out patrolling daily and will continue to do so throughout the winter months. But with fewer people on the beach there is more time to catch up on some maintenance. This week they’ve been working on getting signs back up that were knocked down in the recent high tides. We maintain over 300 signs up and down the beach front, and it’s a constant process keeping them up. Every time the surf or tides get unusually high we have to get out there with a water pump and reset the posts or we need to re-attach signs that were blown down. Of course, we have signs to warn about areas that are dangerous to swim in like the groins or the ends of the island. But we also have beach ordinance signs on the back of each tower and rip current and beach rule signs at the base of every staircase, beach park entrance, and paths that people use to access the beach on the east end. We even have signs to warn about underwater rocks and debris. And if there is a rip current that pops up unexpectedly in an open beach area, we have temporary sandwich board signs warning the public.

These signs require a lot of work to maintain, but we don’t have the resources, personnel, or ability to be everywhere all the time. At least the bilingual, iconic signs we place around the island give the public a chance to avoid dangerous areas when they see them. A sign will never replace a lifeguard, but they are an integral part of the safety net.

Change Overtime

A group of 17 stood in the sand outside of a green and white trailer at Stewart Beach. Their feet were so dark they had a greenish tint against the white sand because they worked with minimal sun protection. Walkie talkies were issued as they joked around and made plans for after work.

In 1983 we only had 17 lifeguards on staff. We made $2.75 an hour and worked 6-7 days a week. New guards moved around, but guards with more experience primarily worked one tower and were assigned the more challenging ones. There were no formal lunch breaks. Instead, you took a quick break if you felt no swimmers would get in trouble. Most of us brought our lunches. There was not enough sand on the seawall for people to use lots of the areas, so we only covered about a third of the groins. Most of the crowd was at Stewart Beach and Apffel Park (now “East Beach Park”). There was no formal lifeguard training academy, you learned from other guards as you went along. Because of the lack of coverage we made a ton of rescues, especially when working the mobile patrols. We also broke up lots of fights and dealt with many more drowning fatalities than we do now.

Stewart Beach was the heart of the beach life for us. Not only was that where we started and ended each workday, but things were booming. There were two huge clubs on the beach that had live rock music. Some of us worked as bouncers after our lifeguarding shift. There were bumper boats, go carts, two water slides, little vendor shacks on the sand, miniature golf, and more. A lot of us would go to the blues bar at one of the water slides after work and hang with the local crew, bikers, and whatever tourist was brave enough to wander in.

The changes from then to now are significant. We have about 100 more guards on staff and cover every groin, for many of which we provide a double shift and work till dark. Guards have a set lunch break and reasonable hours so they can stay sharp and attentive. A formal academy and daily training ensures consistency, professionalism, and reduced liability for the city. We also provide both patrols and emergency response 2/7/365. And we make over 200,000 preventative actions a year instead of waiting to react to a crisis.

So maybe its not as fun now as then. But now we have quick backup for the guards when they get into the life-threatening situation of making a rescue. We work in tandem in the trucks more of the time, so our Supervisors are able to watch each other’s backs. And we don’t leave the public unprotected during working hours.

The thinner you stretch your resources, the more risk for guards and the public. One important measure of success is, because of our level of resources, we now average, with 7 million tourists, 6 drownings instead of 18-25 annually.

Pleasure Pier Rescue

Late in the day on Sunday, September 29th two young women entered the water underneath the Pleasure Pier. It was a very rough day with red flag warnings and rip current advisories, and the beach was crowded with thousands of swimmers in the water. This late in the year we didn’t have enough guards to staff tower 25.

The two women stepped into a deep area caused by the interaction of the current and posts and were swept out by a strong rip current. They flailed in the water panicking. One was able to grab a barnacle encrusted post in a bear hug and keep herself above water. The other tried to make it to the next post and repeatedly tried to climb up, ripping the skin off her fingertips and getting sliced by the barnacles. She started to go under and began to “climb the ladder”, meaning she was actively drowning and ineffectively throwing her arms out in front of her to catch one more breath.

Supervisors Michael Lucero and Mary Stewart were both at tower 24 checking with the lifeguard, Matthew Sicilio, when they saw a familiar figure in a blue shirt waving them over. Carlos Guerra, one of our most active volunteer Wave Watchers was patrolling the area and spotted the two women in trouble. On the way the police dispatcher said they’d received multiple 911 calls and were sending the Galveston Marine Response group (fire, police, and EMS). They arrived to find a large crowd yelling and pointing but no one could actually see either of the two women.

Lucero grabbed his rescue fins and tube and ran under the pier as Stewart assumed “Incident Command”. She directed Lifeguard Matthew Sicilio to run from his tower at 24 and help Lucero. Lucero then “dolphin dove” to the east side and then used the same rip current that sucked the women out. But for him it was a way to get quickly away from shore. He looked back to see Carlos using Beach Patrol signals to direct him to the victims, who were under the pier and hard to spot. He found the first one hanging on the post and saw the second one trying ineffectively to latch on to the next post out. He asked the first woman if she could hang on a little longer. When she said she could and told him where her friend was, he swam farther out and got to the second woman just as she submerged for the final time.

Matthew Sicilio and long-time surfer Erich Schlegel swam out to help. Matthew ended up taking the second victim in and Erich helped make contact and then helped Lucero bring the first victim to shore. They turned the two women over the fire and EMS on shore as the police provided crowd control. One was transported to the Emergency room in stable condition.

This was really close. Many threads of our larger safety net had to come together to save these two women.

This Coming Year

We just finished the budget process for the Beach Patrol’s next year and I gave a short presentation on Beach Patrol in general, the coming year, and where we’re headed to our Board of Directors. I though selected parts of this might be of interest. I think it helps get the point across that we are not just a lifeguard service but an overall safety net with many different pieces all working together.

The mission of the Galveston Island Beach Patrol is to provide professional lifeguard service to the City of Galveston’s beaches through the direct prevention of and response to aquatic accidents and through public education. We felt public education was a big enough part of preventing drowning deaths that it should be in the defining sentence about the service.

Annually we average 170,000 Preventions (moving people away from danger), 150 Rescues, 1,800 Enforcements, and 1,800 Medical Responses. The medical and enforcement responses are mostly cases of being able to filter calls for the police, EMS, and fire departments. If we treat minor medical emergencies or do things like settle disputes or enforce ordinances those are calls that the other departments don’t have to waste time and energy responding to. Its helpful that we have a very small in-house police department.

We routinely patrol 33 Miles of Beach but provide emergency response to over 70 Miles of Coastline all year. During 7 months of the year we proactively guard 9 miles of beach out of 32 lifeguard towers. In the summer we provide daily west end patrols and weekend patrols at the San Luis Pass. Just in the past 5 years we’ve taken on a San Luis Pass patrol on summer weekends, 7 day a week summer patrol of the west end, and guarding the new “Babe’s Beach” west of 61st.

We are involved in a multitude of community programs including the Junior Lifeguard Program, Water Safety School Outreach (26,000 kids this year), Jesse Tree/Beach Patrol Survivor Support Network, Wave Watchers, Basic Water Rescue instruction for public safety and surf camp instructors, and the Galveston Marine Response Group. We are also enhancing operations with a couple of new enclosed fiberglass towers with coastal marine life wraps on them next year. All of this will be accomplished next year with a budget of only 3.1 million, 117 seasonal employees, and 14 fulltime employees who have lifeguard training plus the addition of Swiftwater Rescue, National Incident Management System certification, are Personal Rescue Water Craft Operators, Certified Tourist Ambassadors, EMTs, Red Cross/USLA Instructors, some are Peace Officers, and more.

This coming year we are focusing on a patient transport capable vehicle for the San Luis Pass to help get people off the sand to EMS units, growing our year round staff’s SCUBA capabilities and getting our new tower sponsorship program off the ground.

We also are focused on the establishment of sustainable levels of service within new budgetary constraints so we can make recommendations on what the minimum necessary are to prevent drowning rates from increasing. As we move into a future with increasing beach use, we need to address the need for growth with future beach nourishment projects, funding challenges, a marked increase during the shoulder season of fall and spring and even winter, increase in use of west end beaches, and creative funding solutions to help us target higher risk drowning populations.

Public Safety

Dropping off the seawall heading west on 3005 I spotted a man lying in the middle of the road. Two other guys were attempting to help him up and pull him to the side. There were a couple of cars parked all crazy on the side of the road. The man was bleeding on his legs and arms. Thinking a car had hit the guy, I pulled over and put on my overhead lights, called for EMS, Fire, and Police backup, grabbed my trauma kit, and stepped out to the group while pulling on latex gloves.

Surprisingly, no one had hit the man. The two cars were Good Samaritans who pulled over to help the guy. He told me he had tripped and fallen. As I evaluated him, I saw no evidence of intoxication, he was wearing old and unwashed clothing, and he was oriented for the most part, aside from thinking he was in Bolivar. The cavalry arrived, blocked traffic more effectively, and EMS ran some tests. While that was going on, a firefighter began helping me clean and bandage his wounds, some of which were several days old. We also cleaned what looked to be old dried excrement off his legs. There were probably 10 of us there in total and to a person everyone was supportive and respectful to this poor guy. Galveston Police Department Sergeant Nick McDermott even stayed after everyone left when the man refused transport and helped try to make sure the guy ended up somewhere safe, Nick was off duty and headed home but probably spent 45 extra minutes out there.

Last week I stopped to help a woman who was stranded on 3005 and Pabst Road. She had two young children in the car and was having a hard time dealing with them and figuring out what to do. As I attempted to jump start the vehicle, GPD Sgt. Sean Migues pulled up and asked if he could help. Long story short, he not only helped but volunteered to drive the woman and her children to her house when we were unable to get the car started. He was respectful and helpful to her and basically took charge of the kids. Way beyond the call of anything that would be expected. This is not unusual for him but is merely the latest in a long line of things I’ve noticed him doing in the field. Sean is a former Beach Patrol Supervisor/Officer and was a marine who at one time was assigned on the President’s personal protection detail.

In Public Safety, the big rescues and emergencies are important and garner public attention. But it’s the little day to day kindnesses that truly serve the public and make or break our organizations. We see the spectacle when some of us don’t do the right thing in the media, but often forget to notice the good that happens every day with the vast majority of first responders. Galveston is very lucky to have good leadership and good people in all our public safety groups.

Jellyfish

Last week one morning I was training. I was alternating racing rescue board legs, running, and swim legs. This time of year, working out is just maintaining skills and staying in decent shape for winter lifeguarding, so I was coasting along on my second swim thinking about something else, when I felt something I haven’t dealt with for a while. I felt little strings across my chest, down my belly, and down my legs. I wasn’t expecting it since we’ve had very few all summer. It was probably a Japanese Jellyfish, or “Sea Nettle”. The bad part is you feel the tentacles and there’s a gap before the pain starts. And you don’t know how bad it will get. This one was moderate but managed to find its way inside my suit, so maybe worse than moderate in select areas!

Jellyfish and man-o-war are more common in late summer although we typically have both year-round. If they are numerous, we fly a purple flag in addition to the red, yellow, or green condition flags on the back of the towers, at strategic locations on the seawall, and at the entrances to the beach parks. There are also flags at Jamaica Beach, in front of some hotels, and at a couple of sites on the Bolivar Peninsula. We post the daily flag colors on our website and you can sign up to get e-mail and text notifications to help you plan your beach day.

The current treatment for jellyfish in our part of the planet that the World Health Organization and the International Lifesaving Federation recommend is saline. If you don’t have saline the next best thing is actual seawater. If there are tentacles still on the skin, you should first douse the area with the saline, then remove them using a glove or cloth so as not to get stung yourself. Then rinse the area completely to make sure all the little stinging cells (nematocysts) that have not yet fired are gone. This will keep the sting from getting worse. A sting from a man-o-war or jellyfish can be extremely painful, especially if the sting is in a tender area. Fortunately the sting is just on the surface of the skin so a true allergic reaction is very rare. That’s not to say people that get stung won’t get abdominal cramps or feel panicky. This is a pretty normal reaction to any pain when the person doesn’t know how bad it’s going to get.

Another thing to remember about the jellyfish is that they, and their cousins the man-o-war, can still sting you after they’ve been washed up on the beach for some time. Kids love to pick up the “balloons” on the beach and some like to pop the man-o-war with sticks. It’s not pretty when the juice spurts up and gets in an eye.

The good thing is that overall, we’ve had a pattern of very few stinging critters for a couple of years, so you probably won’t have my bad luck!

Open Water Swimming

As the rookie lifeguard ran out into the water, she felt good at first. She lifted her legs up high just as the instructor told her. When she got to thigh deep water, she started “dolphin diving” by pushing off the bottom and doing shallow surface dives, propelling herself into deeper water quickly. She even managed to dive over a couple of waves without having them knock her back. Then she took one final dive and pushed off the bottom. And things started falling apart. A wave hit her and knocked her back. She tried to make forward progress through the whitewater “soup” that trailed the breaking wave. She quickly tired, lost her sense of direction, and had to resort to breaststroke to make forward progress.

This is typical for entry level open water swimmers, even those who are really good in the pool. Open water swimming is its own skill set that only roughly parallels what we learn in the pool. And open water swimming in surf is yet another level. But open water swimming that’s quickly taking off, and triathlon has gotten crazy popular in recent years. If you are one of those who are starting or are interested in starting to swim in the open water here are a few pointers.

First of all, you should be able to swim at least double the distance in a pool that you plan on swimming in open water. Second, if the water is cold enough to wear a wetsuit you should. Not only is it faster, but a layer of neoprene adds a lot of flotation which means you essentially are bringing a lifejacket with you. Third, in open water you don’t usually get to touch bottom so you want to go a little slower than you might try to go in a pool. Conserving a little air and strength gives you a margin for error that makes it easier to recover if you hit some chop or get smacked by someone’s foot by accident. The extra buoyancy of saltwater will help as well. Another good trick is that if you’re not a strong swimmer it’s not a bad idea to line up on the side of your swim wave, so you don’t get knocked around when everyone is starting off and not yet spread out. You’ll actually do better as a strong swimmer by lining up in the middle of the pack because if you get behind a group of slightly faster swimmers you can benefit from getting sucked along in their draft. Finally, a great tip is to look up every few strokes as you breathe (eyes first, breath second). Even if this slows you a little, you’ll be faster overall because you’ll swim a straighter course.

For surf you need to add numerous extra skills like diving under waves, using the complicated ocean currents to your advantage, and looking around you when you hit the top of swells. It’s definitely a challenge for our new guards but is an essential component of being an effective ocean lifesaver.

Busy Labor Day Weekened

Labor Day weekend was interesting. We couldn’t have asked for better conditions, with sunny skies, blue/green water that was pretty flat all but Monday, and almost no seaweed, jellyfish, or sea lice. The concentration of people on Sunday was impressive with moderately good crowds on the other days. Sunday afternoon it took me an hour and a half to patrol from Stewart Beach to 91st and back, and the line to get into Stewart Beach was backed up onto the seawall.

Sunday afternoon, when the crowds were at their peak, we had several water related calls all happen simultaneously. We had several lost kids at Stewart Beach that we were looking for and the normal calls for guards and rescue trucks moving people away from hazardous areas. Then on top of all that we had a call for a boat wreck off of the end of the South Jetty with 5 people unaccounted for in the water. We also had a call of a possible drowning over by Murdoch’s pier where supposedly someone had seen the person go in and may or may not have actually witnessed them going under. And we had a jet ski on the west end that was floating around in the water without a driver. Any of these calls could have been pretty major, and we scrambled our resources around trying to get enough assets to respond to these potentially serious calls while still handling the normal stuff and while continuing to patrol and be proactive in preventing bad things from happening. It was about an hour of chaos and I think our poor dispatchers probably will have nightmares about trying to stay on top of all of it. But the Beach Patrol staff, and all the other responding groups, handled this crisis period really well. And fortunately, at the end of the hour, everyone was accounted for, on shore, and uninjured. We were able to go back to the normal level of holiday weekend chaos until a little after dark.

All told a the end of the weekend the combination of Beach Patrol, Wave Watchers, and the County’s Citizens Emergency Response Team kept 12,562 people from getting in a dangerous position, treated 40 medical calls, reunited 15 lost children with their loved ones, and got all 250-300,000 beach goers back home safely. Not a bad way to end the summer!

Coming up we have an interesting study. Beach Patrol Lifeguard Supervisor and A&M Instructional Associate Professor Amie Hufton is spearheading a research project related to our drowning and rescue statistics. We’re real excited about this because we think it can give us a better idea of who drowns and how we can target those populations. Just as a little teaser we ran 5 years of drowning statistics and came up with some interesting information. Over that period, we’re looking at roughly 70% of those drownings (fatalities and survivals) being Latino, 22% Anglo, and 11% African American. Stay tuned for what Amie and her team come up with.

Labor Day

With Labor Day upon us we’re expecting several hundred thousand people to be on the island this weekend. That’s a lot of chances to have something go wrong.

We’ve had a number of close calls in recent weeks. Most or all of these incidents happened at least partly due to momentary lapses in judgment.

People do things when on vacation or out recreating that they would never do in their normal life. Parents who no doubt are normally very attentive to their children lose them repeatedly at our large beach parks. We can have up to 60 lost kids in a single day at Stewart Beach alone. People who are not generally risk takers swim far from shore and/or pay no attention to warning signs, flags, or lifeguard instructions. Are the parents bad parents? Are the people ignoring safety messages intentionally? Not in my opinion.

All of us get in a different mindset when we’re away from our routine and when we do something fun. We throw caution to the wind and immerse ourselves in the sea and sand and fun. This is good to a point, and that point is sometimes the shoreline. Water is not our natural element. Things can go wrong quickly in the water, so it only takes a momentary lapse of judgment, or seconds of inattention, for things to break bad.

But it doesn’t have to be that way. Taking a moment to observe your surroundings at the beach or pool does a lot. Asking someone who is knowledgeable, like a lifeguard, for advice before getting wet means that you greatly reduce your chances of an accident.

When you go out this weekend to enjoy any type of water, remember to take a moment to be aware of your surroundings and potential risks. You also want to remember the basics, such as not swimming alone, staying hydrated, protecting yourself from the sun, observing signs and flags, feet first first time, alcohol and water don’t mix, and non-swimmers and children should wear life jackets. At the beach, you should also avoid swimming in areas where rip currents are likely, like near piers and jetties. These are protected by lifeguards and clearly marked with bilingual, iconic signage. You also want to avoid the water in the Ship Channel and San Luis Pass.

Choose to swim in areas protected by lifeguards. In beaches guarded by United States Lifesaving Association lifeguards, like Galveston, your chances of drowning are 1 in 18 million. In fact, we are certified as an “Advanced Level” lifeguard agency.

But above all, YOU are responsible for the safety of both yourself and your family. Lifeguards provide an extra layer of protection in case your safety net lapses temporarily. We will be out in force, along with our partners in public safety. Additionally, the County’s Citizens Emergency Response Team (CERT) will be at the Pass, Beach Patrol Wave Watchers up and down the beach, and the Jesse Tree Survivor Support Network will be on standby.

Enjoy the Labor Day weekend. See you on the beach!