swimming and drowning

An old friend of mine in the 70s saw a girl jump of a bridge in Winnipeg. He went into the river and saved her, but lost his own life in the process. Why? Because he never learned to swim. This kind of thing happens all to often. I think passing a certain level of swimming capability should be mandatory forelementary school graduation across the country. The senselessness of these deaths really piss me off.

Must be more to the story FYB .

How did he save her if he didn’t know how to swim ? He would just sink .

Did he grab a life preserver ( ring ) and thought it would carry both of them ?

Sounds like she decided not to end her life and swam out and he unfortunately was taken in by trying to do the right thing when it most likely would have ended both their lives if he didn’t know how to swim and neither did she without any flotation device to assist in the water rescue .

here is the latest example of hundreds over the years. This guy even knew a little swimming

https://www.msn.com/en-ca/news/canada/your-son-died-saving-my-little-girl-calgary-man-dies-while-rescuing-girl-in-bc/ar-AACidEG?ocid=spartanntp

I did take some swimming lessons, never did learn how to swim. If I go in the water I would just be a like a rock you would toss into a lake or river… I would sink to the bottom. The ironic thing is, I work at an indoor pool, cleaning… only time we go near the pool is to take out an aquabot, once or twice a week.

I can tell you that yes, everyone if possible should learn swimming skills as soon as possible. When I was younger, around grade 9 or 10 a bunch of us were jumping off the bridge at Fanshawe Dam in London Ont and one of the kids started panicking looking like he was going down so myself and a friend swam over and we both grabbed him under the shoulders and brought him to shore. Without any formal life saving skills though at that time, even just getting him to shore about I’d say maybe 25 yards we were both so tired and exhausted but at least we knew how to swim because my parents made me take swimming lessons as a young kid.

Still sort of frightening when I think about this. Excellent topic FYB and yes, so sad to hear of these types of deaths.

wasn’t there

one doesn’t always sink because they don’t know how to swim. Knowing how to swim is not just knowing how to stay afloat but knowing which way to swim in circumstances. In a river and ocean there are currents and moving water that one needs to know how to deal with or else one wears out too quick.