Parents,
In my twenty years of teaching swimming and working with a community dedicated to water safety, I’ve heard so many stories of lives lost to drowning. I carry them with me. Every time I enter the water, these stories enter with me.
There’s the one with the little girl at summer camp whose sweet life would have been saved if they’d only given her a life jacket like her parents requested.
There’s the one who they thought was playing in his room.
There’s the one where it was the day after he’d finished a round of swim lessons.
There’s the one whose brother was helping set up for the birthday party and left the gate open and he was only ten years old and he was only trying to help and no one blames him, but does he?
There’s the one where she was drowning, so her father jumped in to save her, and he did save her, but he couldn’t really swim himself and she couldn’t lift him or find anyone else to help.
There’s the one where he was such a good swimmer, but the lake was wider than he thought and his friends couldn’t find him.
There’s the one where she drowned within arms reach of her father, but he was turned around and watching her siblings do cannonballs and he didn’t hear her get back in.
There’s the one where it was twins. There’s the one where they were at the birthday party and his mother had just seen him, just broken a brownie in two and shared it with him. She was still eating her half when they found him.
There’s the one where he stepped away for just a second because the baby had just thrown up all over his wife and he just wanted to make sure they were ok.
Drowning is swift and silent and preventable.
Roughly half of all drowning-related deaths in children have happened with an adult present. In the 5 seconds it takes you to turn around and arrange your towel on a lawn chair, a child can become submerged. In the 20 seconds it takes you to respond to a text, a child can flood their lungs and drown. In the minute it takes you to walk back into the house and grab a drink, a child can lose consciousness and suffer a fatal drowning accident. For every child who dies from drowning, another 5 receive emergency care for nonfatal drownings. Children ages 1-4yrs old have the highest drowning rates– most of which occur in home swimming pools or bathtubs.
As we approach the summer season in Central Texas, where water is such a major source of recreational fun, I want you to remember one thing: Water is wild. It is a beautiful beast that, when approached correctly, can be one of the most rewarding experiences to connect with, but it is still wild. Anytime you interact with a wild animal, you want to do so safely.
We need barriers — fences, gates, locked doors — to protect access.
We need undistracted supervision, eyes on every second.
We need life jackets, swimming lessons, and CPR training.
We need to treat water with the respect we’d give any wild thing.
Please, as we enter the months of lake days and poolside parties and river cookouts and summer camp, remember what the water is. It is a serene glass lake, an opportunity to help the kids burn off some energy, a nightly routine, a party host, a fun thing to do, and the water is wild. Respect it. Prepare for it. Never take your eyes off it.
Sincerely,
Sarah Wheeler
Director of Operations
Waterloo Swimming