In my last column I described how the WAVE (Water Awareness & Visitor Education) project was born in 2007 and I began to talk about our goals for the project in 2008 (and beyond). Our general goal is to have
In my last column I described how the WAVE (Water Awareness & Visitor Education) project was born in 2007 and I began to talk about our goals for the project in 2008 (and beyond). Our general goal is to have it become as recognizable an acronym as Monk Seal Preservation (and our hats are off to the Monk Seal Preservationists!). The underlying idea of course is that education/prevention has to partner with direct lifeguarding in order to have a good ocean safety program. Good educational tools exist, and what we’re striving for with WAVE is for the visitor industry to know about these tools and to gently and effectively offer them to all of our visitors, making us the true island of aloha.
So, what are the specific goals for WAVE as it moves forward?
• Advertising that the project exists. We’re working on just where to advertise, and on getting the necessary funding for that.
• Continuing our on-site (i.e. hotel/time-share/condo) presentations, which are based on Pat Durkin’s remarkable slide show and which feature two interacting speakers, Mr. Durkin plus a lifeguard (or sometimes me). This presentation lasts for between half an hour and an hour, depending on the time constraints of the hotel staff. On our wish-list for presentations this year are the Princeville Hotel, Kalapaki Marriott, Kiahuna, Hilton, Aloha Beach Resort, Hanalei Beach Resort, and the Resort Quest chain. If you’re reading this, please contact Mr. Durkin at pdurkin@aquaticexpert.com, and he’ll set up a program. (He has been contacting you, so far without result). Last year’s presentations were at the Poipu Sheraton, the Hyatt, the Lions Club, Expedia, and Wilcox Hospital — thank you for inviting us. In these presentations we review Kaua‘i’s most popular beaches and what you should tell people about them, how you access the ocean safety Web site, how you obtain brochures, and how you can distribute and display these and other tools.
• Data collection. We got started on this last year, and in small survey samples we found that, for example, only 9 percent of our visitors had seen the kauaiexplorer.com Web site; 25 percent had seen the Kauai Beach Guide; 41 percent had received beach safety advice from a concierge or activity desk worker. (Note: My own impression has been that our desk workers do much better than this 41 percent, but surveys help us objectively see how we’re really doing).
• Development and distribution of some really neat 8 x 11 posters that show diagrams of popular beaches and where the rips are. The O‘ahu North Shore lifeguards have done this on O‘ahu, and when you walk into most any surf shop or rental shop you can see the poster right under the laminate on their desks.
A brief aside: I enjoy making occasional informal visits to hotel lobbies to see how ocean safety is going, and this week I did so at the Waiohai Marriott. Moki Okami is the Loss Prevention Officer there, and he has spearheaded a program that I graded A+. I counted seven desktop locations (registration and activities desks and shops) where he has the Web site’s Daily Ocean Conditions report in an upright plexiglass frame. He puts a Kauai Beach Guide in every room’s packet, along with a very tasteful brochure that he himself has put together and that contains excellent ocean safety advice. And his staff seemed very on-their-toes in looking for opportunities to share an ocean safety moment with their visitors as they wandered out towards the beach (a beach, incidentally, which the staff advises they not swim at because of a tricky rip current that has claimed a steady number of mostly elderly victims whose hearts run out of gas as they try to swim back in against the current). Mahalo, Moki, for your aloha. Aloha means love, as Larry Rivera so smoothly sings.
I also stopped in at the Resort Quest at Makaiwa, and I learned that all five of our Resort Quests give each registering visitor a packet that contains excellent ocean safety advice, and they have the visitor sign off that they’ve read the advice. Good stuff. We have come a long, long way in the last 10 to 15 years, thanks to you.
Very briefly, our other 2007 accomplishments:
• kauaiexplorer.com continued to develop and improve, and is continuing to do so. This really has been a great pioneer and cornerstone, and now we just have to keep working to get it out there in front of people, as is happening at the Waiohai.
• Wilcox Hospital purchased its own supply of Kauai Beach Guide brochures, with their logo on them. These are kept in racks at various entryways to the hospital, and my hope is that other businesses and hotels will follow suit in this type of purchase and will thereby make the brochures into a self-sustaining Kaua‘i fixture.
• Back in March we had our first Kauai Ocean Safety Conference, and we believe it was a great success in bringing over 100 of us together to share in discussing Kaua‘i’s ocean safety challenges and developments and tools. We won’t be having one this year, but in mid-April Kaua‘i will be hosting the annual meeting of the U.S. Lifeguard Association. This is big, and I’ll have much more on this in upcoming columns.
• The state came out with a statewide ocean safety Web site, oceansafety.soest.hawaii.edu. The governor herself recognized a Beach Safety Week partly in order to introduce this Web site. I’m of course partial to our kauaiexplorer.com, but there certainly is excellent state-wide information and outstanding graphics on the state Web site. “It’s all good.”
• Last and by no means least: Kalani Vierra was appointed Kauai Ocean Safety supervisor, a new position. Heretofore we had Northeast and Southwest supervisors, but no head honcho. I can’t tell you how fortunate we are with this appointment, and I will really enjoy witnessing Kaua‘i learning about and warming up to this remarkable gentleman as he takes on his position. Kalani worked his way up from being a beach lifeguard into handling ever more challenging administrative work, and it appears to me that he is already handling his position skillfully and gracefully (with great guidance from Chief Westerman). In the midst of all this he managed to win (with tandem partner Blanche Yoshida) the 2007 tandem surfing World Championship, thanks to a remarkable performance in some very fickle conditions on the Spanish coast. (One amongst several “tough” destinations that they have to go to in order to compete for the championship). I will also mention that his wife Tracy manages Holoholo Charters and they are on my ocean safety ‘A’ list, along with Capt. Andy’s, as I have witnessed them giving out excellent ocean safety advice to all of their clients.
I know there are items that I’ve left out of this 2007/2008 review/preview — but remember, I’m trying, trying to be briefer with these columns.
Addendum: Kaua‘i experienced another terrible death last week at Kipu Falls, our third victim in the last five years. The grieving fiancee is a young nurse from Philadelphia. Kipu Falls obviously doesn’t fall under the purview of ocean safety, but I keep wondering if the thrills enjoyed by those who flock there for the advertised “off-the-beaten-track gem waterfall experience” are worth the suffering that takes place there. There is an excellent, very safety-conscious guided tour (Outfitters Kauai) of the area, but because of the guidebooks many people go there on their own, clueless about what can take place if you’re not knowledgeable and careful. In my opinion, the guidebooks, if they insist on mentioning Kipu Falls, should simply say: “For safety reasons we advise that you only visit Kipu Falls with the guided tour.” How’s about it guidebooks: Join the team, the team that says you can have fun and be safe.
• Monty Downs is an emergency room doctor at Wilcox Memorial Hospital. His column appears every other Wednesday.
