City flexes its summer preparedness muscle

The City of Cape Town’s Summer Festival not only highlighted the Recreation and Parks Department’s summer season preparedness plan, but also served as encouragement for residents and visitors to do their part in ensuring a safer season.

The Summer Festival was held at Muizenberg beach earlier today and included a lifesaving demonstration and mock rescues.

‘The Summer Festival is aimed at keeping beachgoers safe throughout the season and the campaign encourages visitors to do their part in ensuring a safer season. The City will be doing its part as we will have more than 300 lifeguards on duty across beaches and pools,’ said the City of Cape Town’s Mayoral Committee Member for Community Services and Health, Councillor Zahid Badroodien.

The City of Cape Town’s Recreation and Parks Department manages about 260km of the coastline from Silwerstroomstrand on the West Coast to Kogel Bay on the eastern side. This includes 47 beaches, 22 tidal pools and 14 resorts.

Beach attendance reaches a peak of more than 100 000 visitors per day over the festive season and the festival creates awareness of beachgoers’ responsibility in ensuring an incident free day out.

‘Earlier this week we communicated on the number of fatal drownings that have already occurred this season. Numerous people have lost their lives and early indications are the incidents are related to rip currents or swimming in undesignated bathing areas. This is why, along with not swimming when drinking and not leaving children unsupervised, warnings on rip currents and staying within the flags are our four key messages for staying safe on the beach.

‘A visit to the beach should be a day of fun in the sun and we want visitors to have only fond memories. This will only be possible if we all do our part,’ said Councillor Badroodien.

The City’s Social Development and Early Childhood Development Department will support the promotion of child safety, and will register all children arriving at 15 beaches around the metropole, and issue them with an identification tag/armband. In the event that the child is separated from their caregiver/parent, staff will work with other role-players to ensure the reunification of lost children.

‘The City boasts 10 Blue Flag beaches, and one with pilot status, but there is so much more in Cape Town that attracts thousands of daily local and international visitors during the peak season. Months of preparation go into making sure a day at the beach is a safe and relaxing time for everyone and for that our staff, including seasonal lifeguards are to be commended,’ said Councillor Badroodien.

The City’s 24-hour Public Emergency Communication Centre (PECC) will be adequately staffed to ensure that all incidents received are logged and dispatched to the relevant service providers.

Source: City Of Cape Town

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