This compelling, comprehensive, and very readable history of lifeguards along the San Diego Coast follows the evolution and acceptance of the need for public safety and the development of agencies to provide that service. The book chronicles the early pre-lifeguard years where citizens provided the aquatic rescues in bay and ocean. The narrative follows the implementation of private lifeguards at bathhouses along the coast, and finally the creation of the City's lifeguard service. From the ashes of tragic incidents has grown a dedicated professional service that sees its greatest gift being the ability to save another person's life. Examples of tragedies that lead to the growth of the service include: ‚ The death of a bathhouse lifeguard while making a rescue in 1913 paved the way for the implementation of the San Diego Lifeguard Service. ‚ The Ocean Beach Mass drowning May 5, 1918, which provided impetus for beach safety improvements, including more lifeguards.

Lifeguards of San Diego County traces the origins of the nine professional lifeguard agencies that serve the public swimming, diving, and boating along the shorelines of San Diego County. Sporadic lifeguard service existed as early as 1906, but on a single day in 1918, thirteen people drowned at Ocean Beach. The drownings focused community and government attention on the need for consistent lifeguard services along San Diego County's beaches. Today there are more than 600 lifeguards from city and state agencies that serve San Diegans throughout the county. Here for the first time, the origins, experiences, and stories of these dedicated and most often heroic people are woven together into one volume.

Ocean Lifeguards make tens of thousands of rescues every year on the fabled, crowded beaches of Southern California. "Warm Winds and Following Seas: Reflections of a Lifeguard in Paradise" tells their stories, recounts their challenges and rescues, and illustrates the pressures of a misunderstood, high profile and physically difficult profession. From the rite of passage of Lifeguard Training, to the grit and grind of surf rescues and piloting rescue boats in big waves, to life-threatening saves in the icy waters of Northern California, this journey into the world of Ocean Lifeguards offers a fresh perspective on open water lifesaving and these unsung heroes of the coastline.

Stories from Sea Level is a hand-picked assemblage of truly exceptional ocean-related events which occurred within the 50-year span between 1969 and 2019. The lifeguards featured in these stories work for various agencies between San Diego and the Sonoma Coast. Of note, the lifeguards themselves provided the author with the details and specifics necessary to accurately immortalize their remarkable and dramatic events. This collection of their accounts are offered by the author as a sincere homage to all lifeguards (past, present, and future) who diligently patrol the California coastline ensuring the safety of the general public. Ten of these stories capture the details of daring rescues in which the lifeguards' performances were so exceptional that they personified the essence of valor. All ten of these events (as indicated in their accounts) earned the lifeguards prestigious Medal of Valor honors from the United States Lifeguard Association and/or the Governor of California. This award serves as formal recognition and acknowledgement of the highest level of courage and bravery in our profession. Balancing the gallantry and heroics, other stories serve to illuminate the whimsical nature of our profession and the comical shenanigans involved in our interactions with the public. They seem to exemplify the adage that "truth is stranger than fiction." Collectively, these accounts provide the reader with insight and appreciation for the diverse range of duties, responsibilities and joys that lifeguards encounter in the course of performing their duties on the iconic beaches of California. They expose the common bonds that lifeguards from all agencies share and hopefully provide the lay public with an appreciation for the unique skills and incomparable worth of our ocean warriors. Praise for Stories from Sea Level The tales in Ed Vodrazka's riveting book Stories from Sea Level chronicle the entire range of experiences confronted in the course of working as an Ocean Lifeguard-the tragedies will bring tears to your eyes, the rescues will have you on the edge of your seat, the lighthearted stories will capture your heart and make you laugh. This amazing book recounts Medal of Valor rescues, unleashes some of lifeguarding's most unique and compelling characters, documents the heartbreaking fatalities, the friendships and the ironies, the twists of fate and the remarkable resolve of men and women performing extraordinary rescues in a perilous sea. Only Ed Vodrazka could have written this book, for the simple reason he is one of the best-known practitioners of the lifesaving discipline in California. He is one of the most affable, curious and artfully compelling people you'll ever meet. Anyone who has been a lifeguard in Southern California for the last 20 years either knows him or has heard of him. He worked for seven years on the notoriously dangerous North Coast of Sonoma County. His service on the beaches of California spans six decades. He has worked as a field lifesaver and a Lifeguard Training Instructor for California State Parks and Los Angeles County, and has taught EMT and First Responder courses for the City of San Diego Lifeguards. He is a highly coveted public speaker and EMT Instructor. There is no document that represents the full spectrum of the camaraderie, emotion and challenges confronted every day by Ocean Lifeguards more effectively than Stories from Sea Level. This book is mandatory reading for anyone who has an interest in the ocean and the people who make their living at its doorstep. Stories from Sea Level is a book worthy of spending time with. Mike Brousard, Lifeguard Chief Huntington State Beach San Clemente State Beach

Between 1980 and 1990, a total of 57 people perished in the treacherous ocean waters along the Sonoma Coast. That deplorable statistic equated to a fatal drowning occurring every 64 days, thereby condemning the Sonoma Coast as "the most deadly stretch of coastline in the United States." With frigid ocean temperatures which hovered between 48 and 53 degrees, unsuspecting victims, swept into the ocean by powerful shore breaking waves, were quickly overwhelmed. Abalone divers, tempting those same perilous conditions, often met a similar fate. The Sheriff's Helicopter, the primary rescue method at the time, was largely relegated to body-recoveries. The idea that anyone would swim out into the ocean to save a besieged victim was considered ludicrous, since well-meaning bystanders who attempted to rescue victims, often died in the process. In an historic move, despite surprising opposition from the local EMS community, in 1990 the California State Parks recruited 11 Southern California Lifeguards, hand-picked from various beaches between San Diego and Huntington to work the Sonoma Coast. They arrived with impeccable skills in the surf line and a fiery idealism that they could reverse the 50-year trend in drownings. This new frontier of lifeguarding would challenge them in ways they could never have imagined. This is their story. It's a bald-faced retrospective chronicling their rousing successes and their gut-wrenching failures. It's the story of big waves, cold water, unthinkable tragedies, and revelations of glory. It's the story of a brash group of young lifeguards on a mission to accomplish what had previously thought to be impossible - to swim out in deadly seas to snatch victims from the jaws of death.