RIP CURRENT SURVIVAL
Flip, Float, and Follow
Created by the Michigan
Sea Grant
Don't panic if
caught in a dangerous current.
“Flip, Float,
and Follow,” Michigan Sea Grant
Great Lakes, USA – The Great Lakes Surf Rescue
Project (GLSRP) acknowledges
and endorses the Michigan Sea Grant’s “Flip, Float, and Follow” rip current
survival campaign and will be sharing Flip, Float, and Follow at its “Water
Safety Surf Rescue” classes.
“It is critical to understand what it means to flip, float
and follow,” said Elizabeth LaPorte, Michigan Sea Grant’s Communication
and Education Services Director. “The Great Lakes Surf Rescue Project's
on-the-beach educational efforts will clearly demonstrate for the public how to
survive a dangerous current.”
How to use the Flip, Float, and Follow Rip Current Survival
Strategy
1. Flip over onto
your back.
2. Float to keep
your head above water, conserve your energy, and to calm yourself down.
3. Follow the
current until it weakens. Most currents dissipate quickly as they move away
from the shore into deeper water. Ride it out, figure out which direction the
water is flowing and swim perpendicular to the current toward shore.
REMEMBER:
·
As long as you are floating, you are alive.
·
When you are fighting the current, you are drowning –
Wasting your energy and doing the signs of drowning.
“Also remember if you are too tired to swim to shore,
continue floating and signal for help,” said Dave Benjamin, GLSRP
executive director. “As long as you are floating you are alive. When you
are fighting the current, you are drowning.”
“This new campaign and educational materials are
designed to help people remember how to successfully escape a variety of
dangerous currents such as rip currents, channel currents, and structural
currents,” LaPorte concluded.
According to LaPorte, the Michigan Sea Grant’s “flip, float
and follow” public outreach campaign is the result of input from a variety of
first responders and water safety groups that participated in the Great Lakes
Water Safety Conference, sponsored by Michigan Sea Grant in 2011. Sea
Grant's outreach professionals developed new educational materials that clearly
communicate animportant message: don't panic if caught in a dangerous
current.
Like “Stop, Drop, and Roll”, a simple fire safety technique
taught to children, emergency services personnel, and industrial workers as a
component of health and safety training to extinguish a fire on a person's
clothes or hair, it is an effective psychological tool that can be focused on
in order to avoid panic in a terrifying situation.
In the following ABC 57 news segment, “Saving lives this
summer”, 10 year old Juliette Benjamin, shares her knowledge of Flip, Float,
and follow: http://www.abc57.com/news/local/van-buren/Preventing-Summer-Drownings--155889485.html
###
Question: What do you
do if you are ever caught in a rip current?
Answer: FLIP, FLOAT, and FOLLOW [Similar to Stop,
Drop, and Roll if you ever catch on fire.]
1.
FLIP over on your
back
2.
FLOAT to keep your
head above water, conserve your energy, and calm yourself down. [Panic can kill
you.]
3.
FOLLOW the current to
determine which way it is pulling you.
4.
When the current weakens, swim perpendicular to the current
toward shore. If you don’t have the
energy to swim, keep floating and signal for help.
ABOUT THE MICHIGAN SEA GRANT
Michigan Sea Grant fosters economic growth and helps protect
Michigan’s coastal, Great Lakes resources through education, research and
outreach. A collaborative effort of the University of Michigan and Michigan
State University, Michigan Sea Grant is part of the NOAA-National Sea Grant
network of 32 university-based programs.
Since 1991, the Michigan Sea Grant has led the region in
efforts to better communicate key messages to the public about how to be safe
at the beach. The Michigan Sea Grant has collaborated with university
researchers, state government, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric
Administration (NOAA), the National Weather Service and a number of
organizations, including the Marquette Waterfront Safety Task Force, the Great
Lakes Beach and Pier Safety Task Force and most recently, the Great Lakes Surf
Rescue Project.
See Dangerous Currents - Educational Information:
Michigan Sea Grant
Elizabeth Laporte, Communication and Education Services
Director
734-647-0767
###
The Great Lakes Surf Rescue
Project, Inc. (GLSRP) is about saving lives. It is a nonprofit corporation that is a Chapter of the National Drowning Prevention Alliance (NDPA) that tracks drowning statistics, teaches “Water Safety Surf
Rescue” classes, and leads the “Third Coast Ocean
Force” rip current awareness campaign on the Great Lakes.
It has been selected to present at the 2nd International Rip Current Symposium Nov.
1st, 2012 in Sydney, Australia; the 2012 winner of the “Outstanding Service to the Great Lakes Community” award
presented by the Dairyland Surf Classic; the 2011 “Lifesaver of the Year” award winner; and a presenter at the NDPA’s 11th Annual Symposium in
San Diego, March 9, 2012.
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