Boy Saved from Surf Brings Call: Parents Watch Your Children

CAPE MAY – Austin Drandridge was surfing after hours at Poverty Beach when he heard someone cry for “help.” At first, he thought the young boy was playing. But the look of terror on the boy’s face told Dandridge something was wrong. 
“There were big swells, and the tide was coming in,” he recalled. “I had seen some kids playing on the shore break and thought it was a bit strange because there were no adults nearby and they could have been pulled into the water. I had been surfing about 20 minutes when I heard ‘Help, help.’ A boy had been pulled out in the current and was gasping in the water.”
Dandridge, a father of three who lives in Charleston, S.C., and has family here, rushed with his surfboard toward the young boy.
He tried grabbing him, but they both were sucked out further by the current.
Finally, desperate to save the 8-year-old, Dandridge pulled him onto the surfboard and lay atop him, paddling toward shore.
The waves knocked them around a bit, but eventually, they caught one strong enough that “threw them onto the shore.
“His friends on the beach didn’t know what to do,” Dandridge recalled. “His mom was sitting on top of the slope of the beach and ran down to see what had happened. The kid really freaked out. It shook me up as well.”
While this incident had a happy ending, Dandridge stressed that parents need to keep an eye on their children all the time, “because the surf can get big, the tide can come in, and you can get sucked out just sitting at the edge. I scolded the mom a little bit,” he admitted. “People need to be aware of how dangerous the water can be.”
A random survey of beach patrols in Cape May County indicated that as of the morning of July 4, so far it had been a relatively safe summer, with a few “small” rescues happening along the 30 miles of county beaches.
Those contacted — Cape May, Cape May Point, and Stone Harbor — reinforced Dandridge’s advice.
“Right now, one of our biggest concerns is the heat, especially with the elderly, people on medication and young children,” noted Sandy Bosacco, Stone Harbor Beach Patrol captain.
“People need to know their limitations. Use an umbrella; swim in the morning or later in the afternoon. But swim only when the lifeguards are on duty,” he admonished.
A member of the Stone Harbor Beach Patrol for 35 years, Bosacco said they’ve had some people suffer from heat-related issues so far, but overall, their job is to “keep people from being rescued by nipping any potential rescue in the bud.”
Both Cape May Point and the City of Cape May’s beach patrol representatives also noted heat-related incidents along with a few rescues this season and stressed how they try to be pro-active to prevent the need for rescues.
Geoff Rife, captain of Cape May Beach Patrol, noted beachgoers should pay attention to the flag system whose colors indicate the day’s ocean conditions.
He participates in daily calls with the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) where discussion occurs regarding the swells, storms, wind direction and other weather-related factors along the Delaware-Maryland-New Jersey shoreline.
This helps the guards know what to expect so they can take precautions at the beach.
“One of our biggest issues is the changing currents with water moving in and out of Delaware Bay,” noted Ben Swan, captain of the Cape May Point Beach Patrol. “The water can be outgoing in the morning and very calm at low tide, but switch within a half hour or later in the day. We really have to watch for rip currents, especially along the jetties.
“The guards are trained to look at the water for certain characteristics and then adjust the swimming areas,” Swan added. “People really need to swim in front of the lifeguard stands.”
Parents should show their children the location of the lifeguard stand. “If a child can’t find his or her parents, they should know to go to the lifeguards for help,” Swan said.
While Stone Harbor’s 2.5 miles of beaches are fairly flat with a gradual slope, all the beaches can experience rip currents, which are channeled currents that can occur at any beach with breaking waves.
Swimmers should not fight the current; instead swim out of it by staying parallel to the shore.
“Our currents can be really bad,” Swan said about Cape May Point’s 1.1 miles of beaches, which also contain rocks and jetties that can cause problems for the strongest of swimmers and kayakers.
“We get a lot of kayakers who get stuck in the currents and get exhausted and need help. A lot of the time it’s the tourists who need the help because they don’t understand the water conditions we have here.
“We just had one yesterday, in fact,” Swan said referring to a kayaker rescue July 3.
Swimming when lifeguards are present was urged by all the guards, especially because of the beaches’ changing topography, strong lateral winds, increased water moving into the shoreline during the new or full moons, and shifting sands.
Rife said his team and the city’s Beach Safety Advisory Committee have proactively tried to spread the word about beach safety with brochures distributed by beach tag sellers, mailed to homeowners with water bills, and distributed to hotels and other guest houses.
“Please make sure you are swimming when the beach is guarded, and you are in front of a lifeguard stand,” Rife said. “Read the signs at the ramps and watch for the flags to indicate conditions for the day.”
A series of videos by the patrol address safety issues on a variety of topics including body surfing, boogie boarding, warning flags, beach replenishment and beach slope. (https://m.youtube.com/channel/UCAtPCycY–kEI5fA4Bmp8dw/video)
In Cape May, Rife credited a “change in city administration which has been very proactive and supportive of what we’ve wanted to do” with the wide distribution of safety brochures and signs, installation of wooden and rigid plastic ramps to help people navigate the deep sand, and the availability of about 30 wheelchairs to assist those who need help getting to the beach.
“Sometimes the people using the wheelchairs are getting to the beach for the first time,” Rife said. “It’s a great opportunity.”
The constant monitoring of conditions by all the lifeguards helps them stay on top of changing conditions to prevent injuries as well. “We have emergency medical technicians (EMTs) on our patrol, and I’m a paramedic,” Rife said. “We also do a lot of drills to practice rescue operations for treating head, neck and back injuries. We teach the guards how to survey the water to see how the beach changes.
“Our goal is to make sure everyone has a safe summer, and a fun time at the shore,” added Swan.
To contact Karen Knight, email kknight@cmcherald.com.