There has been an ongoing practice at Maracas Beach that has gotten worse over the months, with boats passing at high speeds within tens of metres of swimmers.

First, it was lifeguards riding jet skis they were given to save lives, passing at high speeds within metres of swimmers, and when I warned the lifeguard about this danger, he insisted he had the right to do this obviously dangerous activity. 

While I have not seen this particular practice lately, I have noticed fishermen driving their boats at high speeds within tens of metres of swimmers. Swimmers cannot go out and swim away from the breakers any more because of this dangerous action; to do this once normal practice may end in another Yanik Quesnel incident (in Pigeon Point, Tobago, where a young man's life will never be the same because of dangerous driving by a fisherman in his pirogue, metres from a swimming beach). 

Over the St Peter's Day weekend, there was a race between fishing boats, and these boats were racing within tens of metres of swimmers—racing! Another boat that was not in the race passed within ten metres of us because he was staying off the course and wanted to get to the fishing village. 

Are police and lifeguards not taught what happens when a large sea-going vessel and human flesh come into contact with each other?

Maracas is now a loud, dangerous place to have a swim; every direction is loud music, if not from cars then from DJ's that are allowed to just make noise. Now, you can't swim; all you can do is soak because if you swim outside from the breakers, you may get hit and possibly die from a fisherman showing off for beachgoers, and the lifeguards sit in their huts collecting their salary because they are taught to "save lives" from drowning; there are other ways to die at the beach. 

The Occupational Safety and Health Act (OSHA) applies to everything, not just workplace and town activities; it applies to our everyday lives. Before you destroy another life, I am asking you to act before this happens again. You would not like another person to go through what Quesnel had to endure or to have a visitor suffer the same fate. We do not need another incident before we act.

Brian Joseph

via e-mail