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Texts From the Lifeguard Chair Are Raising Concerns Over Safety

The summer of 2010 will be remembered for its record heat. But it has provided a different memory for Bernard J. Fisher II, the director of health and safety at the American Lifeguard Association.

This was the year he heard a sharp rise in complaints about lifeguards who were texting on the job.

“This issue has really come out for us this year,” Mr. Fisher said, adding that he had heard several dozen complaints about the practice this summer, compared with none in 2008. “Lives are being endangered, if not already lost, because of text messaging.”

The threat is not hypothetical. At a public pool this summer in Duncan, Ariz., a child panicked in the water and was rescued by an adult visitor. Others at the pool said the lifeguard had been texting, and he was fired, said John Basteen Jr., the town manager.

Last summer, a 45-year-old Illinois man drowned at a beach where the guard was texting, according to witnesses deposed in a civil suit against the residential community where the drowning happened.

And two years ago in Ireland, a 10-year-old boy drowned in a pool that was guarded by a young man who had been texting. The guard admitted at a public hearing to texting before the drowning.

The explanations seem clear. Lifeguarding positions are commonly filled by college students who may not want to feel disconnected from their gadgets, even if their job is to devote full attention to watching for signs of trouble.

Mr. Fisher of the lifeguard association said pools and waterfront associations often could not afford to hire well-qualified guards or to supervise guards as closely as they might have in past years.

Organizations have cut lifeguard wages, he said, to the point where many earn minimum wage and pay for their own training and certification, which can cost hundreds of dollars.

“Because of the lack of pay, you can’t pick and choose the caliber of guard you need,” Mr. Fisher said. “Plus, the current generation is a generation of texting.”

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A lifeguard watching the beach at Coney Island last month. The American Lifeguard Association says text messaging by lifeguards has become a serious concern.Credit...Spencer Platt/Getty Images

Paul Atchley, an associate professor of psychology at the University of Kansas who has extensively researched the technology habits of teenagers and young adults, said such behavior was not surprising, even among lifeguards.

“It kind of takes my breath away, but younger people have the capacity and the expectation to be able to communicate all the time,” he said. “When they are excluded from texting networks, their self-esteem declines. I don’t think it’s compulsion to multitask as much as it is a compulsion to belong.”

Even texting in short bursts breaks standard rules for lifeguarding. They are trained to scan their areas in 10-second cycles, because a person can drown in as little as 20 seconds.

Many pools and waterfronts have procedures to prevent guards from using cellphones while on duty. Mary O’Donaghue, the aquatic specialist for the Y.M.C.A. of Greater New York, said the organization’s roughly 200 guards cannot bring electronic devices onto the chair.

In past years, Ms. O’Donaghue said, if guards were caught with cellphones while on duty, they were immediately removed from duty and given another round of training. “Sometimes they continued working with us, sometimes not,” she said.

Starting last year, the organization placed greater emphasis on the issue in its monthly training sessions where lifeguards must acknowledge in writing that they can be fired for carrying electronic devices. Since then, no guards have been found violating the policy.

Clemente Rivera, of Rockaway Beach, Queens, who has been a lifeguard and waterfront supervisor in the New York City area since 1989, said that he often sees guards using their phones. “It’s just rampant,” he said.

Mr. Rivera said he tried an unconventional approach to solving the problem. In 2008, as a regional pool manager for a chain of sports clubs, he saw a lifeguard texting while people were swimming. “I was annoyed,” he said.

The guard quickly slipped the phone in his pocket when he spotted Mr. Rivera, who walked to the edge of the pool. He then called the guard over, asked him to look at something in the water and then gave the guard “a little shove.”

Mr. Rivera’s managers asked him to explain his actions, but he was not reprimanded, and the pool’s guards were never seen texting again.

“Even if the pool’s empty, it’s unconscionable,” Mr. Rivera said.

A version of this article appears in print on  , Section A, Page 21 of the New York edition with the headline: Texts From the Lifeguard Chair Are Raising Concerns Over Safety. Order Reprints | Today’s Paper | Subscribe

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