Florida leads the nation in drowning deaths of children between the ages of one and four, according to the state Department of Health. In a 2013 study, the Sunshine State had the second highest drowning rate nationwide for children 14 years old and younger.
Jennifer Murray watched closely from the side of the swimming pool as her 6-year-old son, Brayden Murray, and friend Zane Divver splashed around in the water during Saturday's Water Safety Day event at Belle Terre Swim and Racquet Club in Palm Coast.
“He knows how to swim a little bit, but not great on floating and safety, so we’re here so he doesn’t have an incident,” said Murray. “I think it’s great for them to do this because we see so much tragedy happening. There was one (drowning) just the other day, so when I saw that and they were having this free event, I thought we should definitely come out.”
Sobering statistics point out the importance of having such information. Florida leads the nation in drowning deaths of children between the ages of one and four, according to the state Department of Health. In a 2013 study, the Sunshine State had the second highest drowning rate nationwide for children 14 years old and younger.
On Thursday, a 10-month-old Palm Coast girl died after wandering into a backyard pool. Flagler County Sheriff Rick Staly said a preliminary investigation revealed that the girl’s family had opened a sliding glass door to cool the home and the girl crawled outside, falling into the pool.
(Sheriff: 10-month-old girl dies in Palm Coast pool)
Saturday's water safety day was preplanned as the third annual WaterSafe event organized by Flagler County Emergency Services, which partnered with agencies and businesses throughout the county to provide an educational yet fun day of water safety instruction geared toward families with young children.
Kafari, Davonn and Sam Oxendine took part in the day's activities accompanied by their grandfather Thomas Oxendine, who said he was grateful for such an event to provide his grandchildren with water safety instruction through hands-on activities led with trained professionals.
“It was very important to bring them out to get swimming lessons,” said Oxendine. “They learned the skills that if they were to get pushed in, they know how to survive, how to get out or come back to the side, so there were some very important lessons today.”
Hosting events like WaterSafe is important because it teaches life-saving skills in addition to connecting families with local resources like My Swim Life, run by Sue Goldberg, which provides swim lessons to children as young as 6-months- old.
“I work with babies six months and up and they learn aquatic survival skills,” Goldberg said. “If they were to fall into a body of water, fall off the steps, they can rotate onto their back and maintain afloat, fully dressed, for up to two hours. To be here in Florida where there is water everywhere, it’s critical.”
Another of the annual event's co-sponsors is Pinch-a-Penny, which sells pool supplies and equipment and also works on pools in the area, putting company employees in a position to help spot potential problems in residential and commercial swimming pools, such as loose drain covers, according to Palm Coast store owner Patrick Griffiths.
“We’ve been supporting it because we’re a family-owned franchise and like to do as much in the community as we can,” Griffiths said. “This is in our industry and it’s important to be a part of it. We do bring pools up to code when we go out and do repairs and try to educate people about that — like drain covers being up to code. Any pool professional is required to bring things like that up to code when they go to a job site.”
The day's activities included “Reach — Throw — Don’t Go,” where kids rescued a firefighter using a rope, a swim noodle and other items that could be found around a swimming pool. The demonstration was designed to teach children the importance of not jumping in the water to save someone, which could place their own lives at risk.
Jim Caggiano, outreach program coordinator for Flagler County Fire Rescue, emphasized the need for Flagler County families to prepare their children for life around water. Fire rescue and Sheriff's Office personnel also provided much of the in-water instruction.
“The purpose of this is to save young lives and to prevent injuries through education,” said Caggiano. “We don’t want tragedies here in Flagler County.”
— Staff Writer Shaun Ryan contributed to this story.