Santa Cruz State lifeguards give warning on digging sand tunnels
An incident at a beach in Santa Cruz County has State lifeguards warning beach goers about the dangers of sand traps.
On Saturday, lifeguards at Seabright Beach were alerted of a boy who had become unresponsive after being trapped under the sand.
When lifeguards got to the boy he was not breathing and had no pulse. They say he had been playing in the sand, digging a tunnel or hole when it collapsed.
Lifeguards performed CPR until other emergency crews came and took him to the hospital.
One of the lifeguards who was first to respond says her training kicked in right away.
“When we got to our patient and did our first check, our primary assessment we like knew what we had to do” says lifeguard Ryan Springer.
“On the last day of training i remember we had a sand entrapment scenario, so we were all doing some kind of test or something and then one of the instructors runs up to us and is like there’s someone buried in the sand! And we all ran down, dug up this mannequin, like the formation that we had like learned through training and then we started CPR on the mannequin and it was pretty helpful for this call.” Springer says.
The boy is miraculously expected to make a full recovery.
Lifeguards are now warning other beach goers how to avoid that kind of situation.
State Parks Lifeguard Supervisor Eddie Rhee-Pizano said, “When you initially dig in the sand, the sand is very moist and it actually holds its shape pretty well. You can dig a nice deep hole or tunnels and caves, but as the sand and day goes on, as it gets hotter the sand does tend to dry out and it gets really soft and light and that’s when it can easily collapse.”
Rhee-Pizano said it can only take a minute of being buried for you to go unconscious.
He also said a good rule to go by when digging holes is only dig as high as the knees of the smallest person in the group.
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An incident at a beach in Santa Cruz County has lifeguards warning beach goers about the dangers of sand traps.
On Saturday, lifeguards at Seabright Beach were alerted of a boy who had become unresponsive after being trapped under the sand.
When lifeguards got to the boy he was not breathing and had no pulse. They say he had been playing in the sand, digging a tunnel or hole when it collapsed.
Lifeguards performed CPR until other emergency crews came and took him to the hospital where miraculously he has made a full recovery.
Lifeguards are now warning other beach goers how to avoid that kind of situation.
State Parks Lifeguard Supervisor Eddie Rhee-Pizano said, “When you initially dig in the sand, the sand is very moist and it actually holds its shape pretty well. You can dig a nice deep hole or tunnels and caves, but as the sand and day goes on, as it gets hotter the sand does tend to dry out and it gets really soft and light and that’s when it can easily collapse.”
Rhee-Pizano said it can only take a minute of being buried for you to go unconscious.
He also said a good rule to go by when digging holes is only dig as high as the knees of the smallest person in the group.
Coming up at 6 p.m. KION’s Ashley Keehn will have more from one of the lifeguards who helped save that boy’s life.
