When it comes to water safety, this has been a difficult year for Kauai. There have been 14 confirmed drownings. That number may rise, depending on autopsy reports of a woman pulled from the water at Kalapaki Bay earlier this
When it comes to water safety, this has been a difficult year for Kauai.
There have been 14 confirmed drownings. That number may rise, depending on autopsy reports of a woman pulled from the water at Kalapaki Bay earlier this month, and a man pulled from the water at Tunnels Beach last week.
While the number of drownings is heart-breaking, it could have been higher if not for the efforts of folks like Dr. Monty Downs and Branch Lotspeich, president of the Rescue Tube Foundation, and others behind the rescue tube stations on Kauai beaches.
The state of Hawaii and the Kauai Lifeguard Association on Aug. 7 signed documents legitimizing rescue tube stations on Kauai beaches. Before that, all those rescue tube stations you’ve seen on the beaches were illegal. Hard to believe, really, that something designed to help folks in trouble in the water would be illegal. But, there was liability concern should something go wrong. No more.
A brief history:
The program started in September 2008, when a concerned citizen hung a lifeguard’s rescue tube on a shoreline shrub at Larsen’s Beach. Soon, a local beachgoer saw someone in distress and grabbed the rescue tube, swam out and saved the individual.
The KLA got involved and started putting up rescue tube stations around Kauai. There are now over 200 such stations on Kauai’s beaches.
It’s estimated in the past five years, there have been about 70 rescue tube activations in dire situations.
And not just on Kauai. There are rescue tube stations on the Big Island and even in North Carolina.
We applaud Downs, Lotspeich, Rotary clubs and others who made this happen.
This program, bottom line, has saved lives.
For that, we thank you.
