Camber sands tragedy

[bibbitybobbityyhat]

What on earth has happened at Camber Sands? Are there insufficient life guards or something? I am not prone to hysteria but I would not be going to that beach anytime soon. Such a terrible event, somewhat buried by other news yesterday and the string of drownings in the last week.

There should be warning signs and information readily available, including currents. Blackpool tide comes in in like a circle and you could end up surrounded by sea, so you are careful.
I hear one beach has quick sand areas and horses have been known to sink at certain times.
People need to be responsible and not think somebody else is responsible.

So sorry for those affected by this tragedy.

I don't understand this "victim blaming" nonsense. For five men, all from the same group, to drown together on a beach is pretty unheard of, surely? It's an absolutely awful tragedy, but isn't it reasonable to assume that they must have made some poor decisions?

a I am also lying in a watery unmarked grave - but even if I had known what to do, I suspect that I would have panicked as I couldn't get my breath and just flailed about wildly sucking in water

WTF?

Maybe the thread isn't loading properly but this is in terrible taste whatever I've missed.

I remember Hunstanton, we used to go in winter, to watch the waves for The Seagull cafe... over the road/gardens fronm the front.

There were LOADS of signs then - 70s and 80s. Same with all bar the very smallest of coves down in Cornwall. No lifeguards, but always a red ring so high up a post no one could ever reach it (probably to save it from being stolen) and often a sign with a plain warning : The water here is not safe to swim in.

Listenign to Rdaio 2, the 5 men were friends, not immigrats but Sri Lankan, living inLondon, not fully clothed, in swimming trunks/shorts.

I wondered about this. Years ago did it not happens so much because we rarely went to the seaside? No... every summer was a beach holiday, wasn't it?

Do people today just not know that the sea is a 'wild animal' that they need to understand before they intereact with it? I know we were told lots of things, understood rip tides, undertow etc.

One of the radio callers was a tad hissy - apparently it is the government and local authorities fault. They are to blame as they don't put lifeguards on every beach, educate every beach user, etc.

Well, my thoughts on that are the same as they were when coastal paths stated having fences put up along them... to stop people walking off the edge... at some point people have to understand that they do not live in a theme park... hazards are real and Mickey Mouse / a lifeguard / Superman is not going to leap to their rescue should they neglect to think about what they are doing.

Given that I narrowly missed running over man who walked backwards onto a main road to pick up his DCs ball... beckwards so he could watch them and make sure they didn't come out of the garden... he didn't see me, or the bus behind me, until we stopped (watching a bus fill your rear view mirror is not a fun way to pass a second or two). At which point he swore a bit, explained why he was doing what he was doing ... and then walked forward... into another car coming the other way!

I sometimes think we just need to accept Darwinism and let it all go!

It was a link from peregrina on the first page dacre respectthewater here

I did wonder though, just floating seems dangerous to me as you could get drawn towards the pier and slammed into the supports?

Just5 have a click on the link... it will all make perfect sense then. It is quite a hard hitting video!

Just wanted to add this before I leave
www.westbriton.co.uk/8203-how-to-stay-safe-at-sea/story-29643546-detail/story.html

Just5minswithDacre

It referred to this challenge posted earlier on the thread:

www.respectthewater.com/

Thanks sea, that does help with the context ( the App IS loading posts out of order) but a bit if care with wording wouldn't hurt anyway, maybe?

Water safety is taught at schools where I live (between broads and sea) the lifeguards are employed by the local council, not RNLI (who volunteer) (we also teach it at scouts with visits to RNLI and coast guards)
There is a small section of our beach which is patrolled by life guards, flags are out and visible people can see the signs which tells them to swim between the flags as the rest of the beach is not patrolled. They still ignore them.
My own children are not allowed in the sea, they are both good swimmers but knowing of a young girl who drowned here when I was young put the fear of God in me, which I have instilled in them

SeaEagleFeather

floating towards the pier would be very lucky and certainly not a danger, unless there were huge waves.
The main danger is a current pushing you away. As you try to swim against the current you get tired and that's where you get in danger. It's best to follow the current and swim (if safe) or float until safe.

I survived the challenge, but I had a good teacher (dad) and have experienced currents and large waves.

Many people have swimming pool experience and not enough on the sea or with currents.

There have been so many tragedies this past week.

We have visited Camber a lot, and it seems a lovely calm, flat, sandy beach - but there are large sandbanks, and there is a massive pull along the beach, and on occasion, a pull out to sea too. My dc never swim alone, and I have a rule that we (none of us) go out of our depth in the sea.

One time we were there, and I can't remember exactly, but the weather wasn't fabulous, just OK, and quite hazy. I was paddling with my youngest, and my older 2 were swimming a bit further out. My mum and dh were there too.

Suddenly, out of nowhere, this sea mist just rolled in, incredibly quickly. I realised I couldn't see my 2 boys. I could barely see anyone or anything around me. I don't think I've ever been so scared in my life. I just screamed to the boys, and they reappeared, alongside my mum. We found our way out of sea, and back up the beach.

But my god, it was terrifying. In the sea, surrounded by fog. I'm just glad I wasn't further out.

I love the sea, but I'm incredibly careful, it can be scary.

I did manage to get through the challenge on that website, mainly due to some hazy memory of being advised not to swim against currents if possible (it may well have come from a movie!). I suppose in real life things may be very different though, even with the 5-second timer on the site there's no comparison between sitting on your sofa at home and actually being terrified and swept away in freezing water

I remember that terrible story in Norfolk. It was a brother and sister wasn't it, missing for quite a while before they washed up. Never forgotten it .

Obviously no-one knows what happened in this instance, however it is ludicrous to suggest that if someone acts recklessly or stupidly and comes to harm as a result that somehow absolves them of their stupidity.

It is not "victim blaming" to suggest that if someone allows their small child to go in the sea on an inflatable and that child then gets swept out to sea the parent is not stupid for allowing it to happen or even culpable.

There comes a point where we have to be responsible for ourselves and our own actions. The government cannot be held responsible for the way individuals choose to act. Sometimes people drown purely through accident and that is of course a tragedy. But sometimes people come to harm through their own stupidity, wrecklessness and "it will never happen to me" attitude. And it is the volunteers and the people left behind who are left to deal with the fallout.

Similar with e.g. People who go up mountains in bad weather and then end up having to be rescued.

We were at camber last week and spent most days on that beach. My two dcs are 3 and 7 and never out of our sight somewhere like that, and no deeper than knees in the sea and always holding on to one of us. One of the busier days there was a panic stricken man looking for his 5yr old daughter who he had lost track of, I felt so sick watching him running up and down calling for her. That ended happily, luckily but made me more anxious than ever.
RIP to those lost, it's so sad. Feel horribly guilty about being torn between being relieved that we weren't there this week (so that my dcs didn't see what happened yesterday), and also wishing we had been incase we could have helped in any way.

That's quite right Wannabe. No one knows what happened at Camber, and it just does seem so very odd that all five of them lost their lives! You have to admit that is unusual? So why the long diatribe about reckless individuals?

I nearly drowned at Camber sands, its deceiving, I had walked out a fair way when the tide started coming in, np's it wasn't past my knees so I started walking back to the beach, but instead of the water getting shallower it got a heck of a lot deeper and I had to swim and quite strongly too, I remember getting to the beach and being unable to move as my legs were like jelly. Thankfully I had a lot of swim training as I was the local pools trainee instructors guinea pig, but if I hadn't, I honestly don't think I would have made it. I wonder if the same thing happened to these guys, I guess we'll never really know :-( R.I.P.

Certainly, people need to take responsibility for their own safety.

However, I do think a popular beach that attracts 25,000 people on a summer's day should have lifeguards.

lweji, completely believe you about sea swimming being different! went yesterday for the first time in some years, the swimming is much more challenging (in a nice way yesterday; fine weather). Did notice it's much more buoyant than swimming pool water too.

Felt a rip current as a child once though. Not something I want to experience again.

My sister and I got caught in a riptide on the Norfolk coast once, and it was terrifying. I was about 9, my sister was 6. Fortunately, I was swimming in a junior programme for the county, and knew what to do. My sister, by contrast, had refused to go to swimming lessons, and been indulged in that by my mother who always babied her, and consequently wasn't even a good basic swimmer. I therefore had to swim sideways while pulling her to safety and trying to stop her clinging so hard to me that she would drag us both down. I have never, ever tried so hard physically at anything in my life. Fortunately, we got out of it reasonably quickly and I collapsed on the beach and was sick everywhere.

If it hadn't been for water safety lessons, I don't think either of us would be here. And my sister would definitely not have survived thanks to my mother pandering to her wailing about not liking swimming lessons. Please, PLEASE don't indulge kids in refusing to go swimming. There may well come a time when they need that skill and it might not just be their life that's in danger.

My husband was working last night (police) and was involved :(

Camber has a peculiar double spit of sand which results in the tide coming in exceptionally quickly. You go from being ankle deep to waist deep in the central lagoon then ankle deep again. IYSWIM. You can easily get pulled out by the current and if you are an inexperienced sea swimmer then your natural instinct to fight the current is your enemy. It was not a rip tide apparently.

Maybe the five lads knew about the dangers of swimming in the sea, but thought that if they stuck together, they could help each other if anything went wrong? So very sad.

That sounds exactly like what kaelea describes above truffle.

I hope your DP is OK. I always feel for the emergency services dealing with these tragedies. They really see some awful things. for him.

Omfg. Just seen Katie Hopkins tweet. The woman is a horrible right-wing misogynist fat-shaming racist attention seeker (we all know that) but that tweet makes me wonder if she is actually sane?