Should Myrtle Beach be next and follow Horry County in moving away from life guarding model?

It took less than 10 minutes.

There was no press release or photo-friendly announcement along any of the 14-mile beachfront Horry County is responsible for maintaining.

Instead, a new era for public safety in South Carolina’s largest county should happen quietly and through contract renewals filled with legal jargon after a brief Tuesday afternoon meeting.

That’s when Randall Webster, an assistant administrator, stood behind a nondescript dais that ended at his waist, explaining to a room full of people why the time has come for Horry County to divorce itself from a long-used lifeguarding model that overlaps profit with safety.

“We need to separate how lifeguarding and umbrella rentals are done. Right now, it’s together and you’ve seen some things about that, but we all recognize now it’s not the same beach as it was seven years ago,” Webster told a county council subcommittee.

It’s also possible Myrtle Beach leaders will follow suit.

Mayor Brenda Bethune told The Sun News this week that officials are discussing the topic — the first indications after multiple inquiries by the newspaper over several weeks that changes could be on the way.

The city’s contracts John’s Beach Service and Lack’s Beach Service don’t expire until 2024 and 2025 respectively, while the county’s are set to expire in May.

The story of why a shift away from the oft-criticized lifeguarding model seems to be happening finally is marked with tragedy, years’ worth of warnings from several of the country’s leading aquatic safety groups and aggressive local media coverage that includes The Sun News.

The dual role lifeguard system is an American outlier

If the Grand Strand’s beachfront was a highway, its 60 miles would be a sun-soaked corridor to North Carolina’s Carolina Beach. One of America’s most popular getaways, the region draws nearly 20 million visitors annually and powers a multi-billion tourism sector.Association estimates a person swimming on a beach patrolled by organization-certified guards have a 1 in 18 million chance of drowning.

But within Horry County and Myrtle Beach some lifeguards on patrol — which come from the family-run businesses that contract with the communities — are also tasked with managing chair and umbrella rentals, pulling their attention away from the ocean.

It’s a model known as “dual role” guarding that has been discredited by the U.S. Lifesaving Association, Red Cross and other organizations for years

The U.S. Lifesaving Association estimates a person swimming on a beach patrolled by organization-certified guards have a 1 in 18 million chance of drowning.

A 2011 report by the U.S. Lifeguard Standards Coalition suggests more research is needed to determine if “inattentional blindness” affects lifeguarding. However, data culled from more than 63 studies and experiments “indicates that focused attention is needed to detect change.”

A top USLA official told The Sun News abandoning a system that introduces a heightened possibility of inattentiveness could save lives.

“On behalf of the USLA, we’re very pleased to hear that Horry County will be adjusting its lifeguard standards in accordance with USLA recommendations and national norms,” national certification committee chairman Chris Brewster told the newspaper Sept. 14. “I am convinced that this will markedly improve public safety on county beaches.”

A Myrtle Beach visitor was part of the one in 18 million.

Zerihun Kabede Wolde and his family arrived in Myrtle Beach in late August 2018 for a long overdue vacation.

On Aug. 24, the first morning of their trip, Wolde and two of his children entered the ocean as Abel and their twin girls put up a chair and umbrellas, digging into the sand to make a castle.

Though an adept swimmer, Wolde couldn’t have known the trio waded into a rip current. After struggling to free his children, Adam and Wubit, Wolde’s exhaustion overcame him on the current, also known as “aquatic treadmills.”

Drownings, in reality, don’t play out like a TV drama. There is rarely any struggling, screaming or outward indications anything is wrong, which is why constant monitoring from the shore is crucial.

“In this case, you’re swimming and making no progress. Rip currents vary tremendously with respect to how strong they are, how wide they are, the direction they pull,” Brewster told The Sun News in August. “Most people are not able to swim faster than the current so ultimately tire out and submerge, just because they’re completely fatigued.”

In 2019, Abel filed a wrongful death suit against Lack’s Beach Service and the city of Myrtle Beach, saying Wolde’s drowning happened because there was no lifeguard on duty, possibly due to rentals.

A July 19 motion, for example, pointed out that on the day Wolde drowned, Lack’s made $1,200 in sales — with the three lifeguard stations closest to him pulling in $1,173.

A jury agreed with Abel, awarding Wolde’s estate nearly $21 million in damages.

After the verdict, Lack’s attorneys argued that its contract with the city makes it an arm of local government that would cap its penalty at $300,000 under state law. That appeal is still pending, according to court records.

The verdict could be a cautionary tale

Horry County’s contracts with its beach service sunset every seven years. When they’re back up for renewal in May, officials plan to put those contracts back out to bid with clear language separating lifeguarding duties from commercial enterprises.

The county manages roughly 14 miles of public beach, including areas south of North Myrtle Beach to the Dunes Club in Myrtle Beach, south of the Springfield Pier to Surfside Beach town limits and south of Surfside Beach limits through Garden City to the Georgetown County line

Between 2015 and 2019, South Carolina averaged 1.56 drownings for every 100,000 people — ranking it 14th nationally over that span, according to CDC data.

Chris Pracht, a legal team member representing Abel, said her family was gratified by the news.

“From the beginning, her goal was to stop an unsafe practice, and to hear news that Horry County is seriously considering a stop to dual role lifeguarding is very welcome news and something they should be proud of,” he said.

Another significant change to the county’s service agreements would be the creation of umbrella lines, requiring rows of 10 with at least 30 to 50 feet of spacing.

That’s due in the part to the Aug. 10 death of Tammy Perrault, a 63-year-old who was impaled by an umbrella on a Garden City beach.

County Attorney Arrigo Carotti said the steep penalty against Lack’s should give officials “some indication of how litigation of this sort takes place” should it be found guilty in the future of a wrongful death.

This story was originally published September 17, 2022 at 7:00 AM.