Regarding the drowning in the Harrison Lagoon

As a former Head Lifeguard for BC Provincial Parks at Cultus Lake, and a Swiftwater Rescue Technician with Kent Harrison Search and Rescue, I thought I would make a comment regarding the safety of the Harrison Lagoon.

Since the lagoon has a very gentle grade, it is a very safe place where thousands of children and adults have enjoyed the beach. However, three drowning fatalities have occurred in recent years when out of town, young, adult males have tried to swim across the lagoon during a hot, weekend day. The murky water and the weeds are not a problem for swimmers. The problem begins when a few inexperienced swimmers over estimate their ability to swim a longer distance. Even though many young adult males may be in good physical condition, they can still tire very quickly when their muscles are used in a different way than they are used to. Females will usually call for help as soon as they get into trouble and may often be rescued. However, a tired male swimmer typically waits so long after becoming tired, that, by the time he wants to call for help he is no longer able to and drowns silently. Usually few, if any, even realize what is happening.

In the early 1970s, the area surrounding Entrance Bay at Cultus Lake had a log boom around it to protect swimmers from boats. These log booms also attracted hundreds of swimmers every week and many had to be rescued over the years since they were too tired to make it back to the beach. We even had to rescue a body builder once. An exhausted swimmer was easy to spot amongst the crowd because they stop moving and are in a vertical position instead of the normal horizontal swimming position. They also have their hands to their side instead of in front of them. Lifeguards were removed from Cultus Lake Provincial Parks in the 1977. The log booms were also removed and replaced by a few small buoys. In spite of the sharp drop offs in a few spots, there have been few drownings in recent years.

Anything the City of Harrison Hot Springs could place in the middle of the lagoon to help a tired swimmer would just entice more people to swim to it. More signs would not help since the most recent drowning occurred very close to the present warning sign. Placing life rings all over the middle of the lagoon is not practical and may not help. A tired swimmer may not even have enough strength left to hold on to anything. Adding lifeguards can encourage people to take more chances because they know they would likely be rescued.

Even though that may be the case, I believe the best solution to try to eliminate the drownings at the lagoon would be to have a lifeguard at the beach from 11 am to 7 pm during the hot summer weekends. The lifeguard should be equipped with either an open kayak or a personal watercraft (jet skis have no propellers) that has a short rescue board attached like they use at some ocean beaches. This would enable the lifeguard to notice any swimmers who are swimming across the lagoon and be able to cruise closer to their vicinity to monitor their progress. This is what we did with paddleboards at Cultus Lake. If we thought they might need help we casually approached them. If they were just resting, we just returned to the dock. If they were indeed tired, we took them back on the paddleboard when they still had some strength left. While the rescued swimmers were often embarrassed when we took them back to shore, this consequence to a poor decision was far better than a life cut short and a family in grief. Keep your eye open for tired swimmers!

Dave Harder