Life Savers

There was a definite air of something in the offing down at Clovelly this afternoon. Clovelly is the beach we go to most often because it's shape as a narrow channel carved out from the rocks makes it perfect for kids; the Pacific surf pounds the rocks at the narrow entrance to the bay and further in towards the beach it's more like a giant swimming pool; the council having concreted the rocks at various levels and even installed metal stairs so you can get down into the deep water to go snorkelling. And then, just before the beach, there's a real swimming pool and by the time the water hits the shore the breakers have broken and all that's left is a little swishing and splashing, just the sort of thing kids love.

We arrived at the beach around eleven o'clock. Considering the weather's been crap recently, there weren't as many people out as I'd expected. It might have been the first day of decent weather we've had all week but there's Christmas shopping to be done and I suppose the latter won out over the lovely sunshine.

For a while we just sat at the head of the bay and watched the ocean trying to break it's way through the gap in the rocks. It was much rougher than usual, so rough I'd already decided I wouldn't be getting in to go snorkelling, noodle or no noodle. The first level of concrete flooring up from the rocks had already been soaked by the waves, which is unusual because you could normally lie sunbathing there without any risk of getting even slightly wet, even on a windy day. Every so often some new unsuspecting sunbather would pitch up and lie their towel out on a patch of dry land, only to get soaked wet through five minutes later.

Then Darren took Ella to the cliffs to watch the waves. They returned a few minutes later with wet feet.

To our left, a group of pensioners were drying themselves off after a swim. "It was difficult to get out" laughed one of them to another, which seemed like an understatement in the circumstances, the huge swells slamming the water hard against the concrete sides and metal steps of the bay. The surf lifesavers surveyed the water in their red and yellow outfits, grumbling about the people throwing themselves off the edges in time with the arrival of the biggest of the waves. "Bloody idiot. And there go his Crocs as well".

Most people don't realise the difference between the council's own lifeguards (wearing blue and white) and the red and yellow surf lifesavers. The main difference is the salary; the surf-lifesavers are all volunteers, so when you see them launching themselves into the ocean, they're doing it all for free, risking their own lives for the bloody idiots in the rest of the population. Of course, it's not without it's perks; especially since the success of Surf Patrol on channel 7, a programme following average days in the lives of the surf lifesavers from the Gold Cost to Melbourne but chiefly the ones at Bondi Beach. I don't know whether you'd say it glamourises the job but it certainly does their street cred no harm.

Anyway, we eventually moved on and walked down to the sand, via the kiosk, where Ella bagged herself a lifesaver ice lolly (you know, the polonium 210 jobs that won't wash off your skin). Afterwards she built castles and I read a book. By three o'clock we'd packed up and were heading back to the car.

But just as we were dragging the pushchair across the sand we saw the surfies going hell for leather across the beach carrying boxes and oxygen tanks and flotation devices. We carried on up the stairs keeping one eye on the north end of the bay, where they'd been heading.

"It was a false alarm" said Darren. "Look, they've stopped all their frantic activity. Whatever it was, they've sorted it out".

"Well I want to have a look" I replied, walking further up the path to get a better view, at which point the red dinghy was suddenly up alongside us, one surfie at the front frantically instructing swimmers to get out of the way. Behind him a lad in trunks and a santa hat and on the floor, the body of a man or a teenager, impossible to tell.

"Do you need to go?" I asked Darren.

"Yeah". He dropped the beach bag, our bucket and spade clattering out onto the path, then tore off back towards the beach in his flips flops. The surfies landed the dinghy just as Darren reached the bottom of the steps. The body on the floor was a thirty-something man. He was out cold. Drowned.

Now in normal circumstances I'd never have stayed to watch. Apart from anything else, we were already heading away from the beach and once I'd decided it was serious, well it's hardly entertainment is it? But because Darren was involved (and had the car keys in his pocket), there wasn't much more I could do, so I stood against the white fence above the swimming pool while Ella ran up and down the hill, completely unaware that time had stopped on the rest of the beach.

The beach had fallen completely silent so that almost all you could hear were birds and the crashes of the waves. A couple with a baby were the only people in the swimming pool; the mother clutched the baby to her chest and stood frozen looking back towards the sand, her husband next to her. The whole beach were willing the body to be alive.

Most kept a respectful distance. All who'd been sunbathing on the hill came to stand along the white fence next to me. The man's family huddled under a green beach umbrella; a wife and two children. He'd taken his son to have a look at the waves and been swept in with the surf.

Minutes ticked by, ten minutes at least. From my position on the hill I could see Darren giving mouth-to-mouth while a surf lifesaver pounded furiously on the man's chest, all the while his legs flailing out to the side, his belly bobbing up and down under the pressure. From a distance it might as well have been an episode of Surf Patrol but for his wife under the beach umbrella, well, you just can't even imagine coming to Clovelly for the afternoon and ending up slumped under your brolly, your entire life hanging in the balance.

After ten minutes or so a chain-gang of sand digging had formed across the beach, men and boys creating a sand dam as fast as they were able, to prevent the water from creeping up the shore and hampering the rescue attempt. And then there was a clap, which started on the beach and made it's way up the path as far as the cafe. They'd got him back, they'd turned him onto his side and he'd been sick. It was all going to be okay. But then, no, he was back on his back and they were thumping away at his chest. The fifty-something British lady standing next to me began to cry. "He's been gone too long now" she said. "How long until they give up trying".

Eventually the ambos arrived, and with them came all the proper equipment. One of the first things was to intubate the patient, something that Darren's particularly quick at, but no, the ambos wanted to do it themselves. "You won't believe how many people turn up at these situations pretending to be doctors" they told him, which I'm sure is true, but all the same the gods must have been shining on this guy when an (on-call) senior chopperdoc just happened to be passing by and though I could understand why the ambo felt she had to do the job herself, I realised the extent of Darren's patience as he stood back and watched her perform the critical procedure in probably three times as long as it would have taken him to do the same thing. "It's in the hands of the gods" he reasoned later, just before he asked me to go get him a cold beer from the bottle shop.

In the end they managed to get him a blood pressure and a pulse, both pretty weak, and with the airway in situ, they took him off to hospital in the bus (as they call the ambulance). The irony of the situation wasn't lost when we thought back to Darren's whole week on call for the chopperdocs without a single incident, then this patient at the beach, who was later transferred to the intensive care unit he originally worked for.

Funny how things turn out.

nb Ambos, n, Ambulance crew (Australian, slang)

Patient Update

We called the ITU at 7pm. The patient was doing a bit better, breathing for himself, though still desperately sick. Without doubt Darren and the surf lifesavers saved his life. What sort of life he's got remains to be seen.