Fed: Tourist dies outside patrolled beach hours

AAP General News (Australia)
12-20-2001
Fed: Tourist dies outside patrolled beach hours

By Janelle Miles

BRISBANE, Dec 20 AAP - A British tourist who drowned off Queensland's Sunshine Coast
had been swimming outside patrolled beach hours, a council spokesman said today.

The 36-year-old drowned off Sunshine Beach just after 5.30pm (AEST) yesterday.

A Noosa Shire Council spokesman said the surf had been like "a washing machine" where
the man was swimming.

He said an offduty lifeguard who was on the beach at the time had grabbed a jetski
and reached the man quickly but it was too late.

Surf Lifesaving Queensland's Elissa Keenan said young men seemed to be complacent about
swimming between the flags.

"A strong market for us is men aged 15 to 35," she said.

"Often because they're fit, they're strong, they can swim ... they go to the beach,
swim in an unpatrolled area, get caught in a rip and they can't swim against a rip. No-one
can."

Ms Keenan said of the 77 people who drowned off Australia's beaches last year, 83.1
per cent were men and 25 per cent occurred in December.

Royal Life Saving national marketing manager Doug Garske said for a number of tourists,
the combination of being unaware of the water and unused to swimming conditions tragically
ended in death.

"Those visitors who are unfamiliar with our waterways and swimming are at particular
risk," he said.

Mr Garske said research had shown tourists aged 25 to 29 were at the greatest risk
of drowning, most of them men.

Surf beaches were not the only aquatic locations which claimed tourists' lives, Mr Garske said.

"Of all tourists' drownings in the period 1992 to `98, 43 per cent ... were in locations
other than the beach," he said.

"These locations may include pools, rivers, dams, bays and harbours.

"More than 20 per cent occurred in a swimming pool."

AAP jhm/mg/sb

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