A Very Sharky Fourth of July

by Kailey Aiken

The holiday weekend brought the sun, the crowds, the rescues … and the sharks. From the third to the sixth of July, we had shark sightings at least once a day across the beach.

The FDNY Robotics unit was kept busy with shark monitoring on their drones. From a group of several sharks near shore at Beach 32nd street, to one or two hanging around the Beach 91st and 101st Street jetties, the drones were darting up and down our waters keeping an eye on the sharks.

Unsurprisingly, it was difficult to keep people out of the ocean as the sun scorched the beach. Our current protocol is to whistle people out of the water and keep them out until we receive the okay from FDNY.

Aside from sharks, our Fourth of July was relatively calm … until just after 6 p.m., that is. After we left the beach and were taking a shack photo, a PEP officer ran up to tell us that there was a swimmer in distress on Beach 92nd Street, a beach closed for swimming. By the time we arrived, lifeguards from 86 shack had already responded and were bringing in the victims. The FDNY drones had dropped a floatation device that assisted the lifeguards in the rescue.

Twenty minutes later, EMS and FDNY spotted two swimmers in distress near the Beach 98th Street jetty. They responded with their rescue equipment, followed by the lifeguards who still remained at the shack and a few others who saw the situation while biking home and stopped to help.

On Sunday, rough waters, rip currents, and strong winds in the afternoon created a perfect storm for lifeguards across the beach, especially in busy sections. Between 4:30 p.m. and 5 p.m., 97 shack responded to four cases — two of which were rock jetty cases on closed beaches. Just another reminder to only swim where lifeguards are present!

Lifeguards at 106 Shack had their work cut out for them too. Around 5:15 p.m., they rescued a woman on the closed beach side of the Beach 109th Street jetty, who was clinging to the rocks. In a semi-viral social media video, Kieran Howard and Ryleigh Mcginley can be seen working together to pull the victim up onto the rocks. Just when they almost have her to safety, a man walks onto the rocks to “help,” despite the lifeguards telling him to back up and let them do their job. The man slips and falls on the wet rocks, slowly gets up and walks away in a little bit of pain and a lot of embarrassment. With their minor interruption gone, the lifeguards were able to successfully pull the woman up on the jetty and bring her to safety.

The new horns placed in our busy sections were thrown right into the fire this holiday weekend. Coming from only their training at Beach 149th, a slower area where there may be more sharks than patrons at times, the new guards are exposed to very little of what they will have to do at busy beaches — obviously, this isn’t their fault. This weekend they saw firsthand how easily emergencies can occur even if we do everything correctly, and they did a great job responding to these cases.