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Swimming at your own risk

Long stretches of beaches have no lifeguards. The only safeguards provided by government might be warning signs or color-coded flags.

By MELANIE AVE
Published July 26, 2006

TREASURE ISLAND -— Ana Baker relaxed on the sand this week eyeing the tranquil Gulf of Mexico.

It was a far cry from four years ago when Baker watched her son Andrew, then 9, swallowed by a wave about 15 feet off shore on this same strip of beach. It was the day after a storm, and the normally placid surf churned one pounding wave after another.

“He didn’t come up,” Baker, 47, remembered. “I was horrified. My legs were shaking.”

The St. Petersburg woman and another man pulled her son to safety.

With the drowning of a 31-year-old old man off Treasure Island’s main beach on Sunday, Baker is again wondering why the city does not provide lifeguards or water condition reports for beachgoers.

The Florida Supreme Court ruled last year that cities bear some responsibility for safety in public swim areas.

Since the 1997 Miami Beach drownings, which spawned the court ruling, the Legislature passed a law freeing cities from liability when a person drowns or is injured “due to the inherent danger of constantly changing surf and other naturally occurring conditions along Florida’s coast.”

Amid the mixed signals, Pinellas County communities did little more to change the way they inform beachgoers of water conditions beyond the bare essentials — swim-at-your-own-risk signs and buoys to keep boats away from near-shore swim areas.

Only Clearwater provides lifeguards seven days a week year-round and posts color-coded flags when the guards are on duty to alert swimmers to swimming conditions.

Pinellas County offers lifeguards and a flag warning system daily during the summer at Fort De Soto, Sand Key and Fred Howard parks.

Baker wishes lifeguards were more prevalent.

“It would be helpful and let people know if it’s safe to swim,” Baker said as she sat just yards away from Sunday’s incident in which Carlos M. Cardenas Rodriguez drowned.

Family members believe Rodriguez, a strong swimmer, was dragged underwater by a strong current or high waves about 5 p.m. He was found by rescuers several hundred feet from where he was swimming with a 9-year-old cousin.

The National Weather Service said conditions Sunday were right for rip currents, with strong southwest onshore winds.

On walkways leading from the municipal parking lot near where Rodriguez died, a sign reads: “No lifeguard on duty.”

City officials up and down the beaches say they do not believe they are required to use lifeguards and doing so would cost more than the cities can afford.

“There is absolutely no requirement,” said Pinellas County attorney Susan Churuti, “to have a lifeguard.”

Though it calls itself the “World’s Safest Beach,” Indian Rocks Beach does not use lifeguards on its 3.2-mile stretch of sand.

“We could not adequately cover the beach without an army of lifeguards,” said City Manager Al Grieshaber Jr. “It would be cost-prohibitive. Our beaches are open and obvious. You can use them at your pleasure.”

Treasure Island City Manager Ralph Stone said he, the fire chief and city attorney met after the Supreme Court ruling and concluded it only required additional signs in known hazardous areas.

Treasure Island fire Chief Charlie Fant said he posted no-swimming signs at the north and south passes where the currents are strong. He also placed stickers on the signs at all public beach access points warning that beachgoers swim at their own risk.

The Supreme Court ruling involved the drowning of two people off a section of Miami Beach with a food concession stand, shower and changing areas, but no lifeguards. In that case, a swimmer and her would-be rescuer drowned fighting a rip current.

The court’s 4-3 ruling said the city was obligated to warn swimmers of known dangerous conditions such as riptides because the city made the area entice swimmers with facilities from which the city profited.

“It is from that activity of designating this swimming area that the source of the governments’ duty arises,” wrote Justice R. Fred Lewis.

Pompano Beach lawyer Nancy Little Hoffman, who represented the family of one of the drowning victims, said the city was in the same position as any commercial operator would be.

“It had a responsibility to exercise due care, and that would include attempting to warn people if there was a danger they knew about,” Hoffman said. “There had been rip current postings that day but not at this location.”

St. Pete Beach leases two concession areas to vendors, at Pass-a-Grille Beach and Upham Beach, but does not provide lifeguards.

“We treat our beach as a swim-at-your-own-risk beach,” said St. Pete Beach City Manager Mike Bonfield. “I believe our signs indicate that. Generally speaking, our conditions are so benign. It’s relatively calm. You usually have lifeguards when you have a lot of currents.”

St. Pete Beach has similar signs and just completed installing new buoys to designate safe swim zones up and down the town’s beach.

In Clearwater, the city spends about $600,000 a year to provide lifeguard services at eight locations to make the beach safer for families, said Bev Buysse, the city’s marine and aviation department assistant director.

Flags — either red, yellow or green — are hung on the stands when the lifeguards are there to alert swimmers to water conditions, per a recommendation of the United States Lifesaving Association.

Buysse said there have been no drownings in the swim area when the lifeguards have been on duty.

“I would say we have one of the more crowded beaches,” she said. “A lot of tourists feel safer when they come here. They can let their kids play in the water and know there’s someone else watching them.”

Even though Pinellas County uses lifeguards at Fort De Soto Park, parks and recreation operations manager Leah Hoffman said there’s no way it could provide lifeguards to cover all six miles of sand.

“It’s a matter really of money,” she said. “Where there is no lifeguard, there are always big red signs people should see.”

Several officials say swimmers should realize the gulf waters come with some inherent hazards.
Stone said he hasn’t heard one complaint or concern about the safety of Treasure Island’s beaches.

“I grew up on the east coast of Florida in Titusville, and the only thing people ever said about the Gulf of Mexico was that it’s like a lake,” he said. “We have hundreds of thousands of tourists on Pinellas beaches all year, and a drowning can happen at any time, any place.”

Times correspondents Kathy Saunders and Sheila Mullane Estrada and researcher Angie Drobnic Holan contributed to this report. Melanie Ave can be reached at (727)893-8813 or mave@sptimes.com.

[Last modified July 26, 2006, 23:10:29]