It’s Spring Break season! The recent warm weather is ideal for the incoming crowds of visitors we expect along our Gulf beaches. But as we know, having tens of thousands of often inexperienced folks from out of town converging on the water can sometimes lead to tragic outcomes. Overheating, jellyfish, and sunburns are common concerns, but rip currents are the most dangerous. While visible to the trained eye, rip currents can grab an unsuspecting swimmer and pull them away from shore. The innate urge to fight only makes it worse, and people can quickly be in danger of drowning.
Large swaths of public beach are monitored by a well-trained professional lifeguard staff, but they cannot cover every stretch of shoreline. In response to this gap came a solution from two local Rotary clubs. In the last year, the Pensacola Beach and Gulf Breeze Rotary Clubs have installed 45 rescue tubes at marked sites along Pensacola Beach. Rescue tubes are bright yellow foam tubes about 4’ long, easy for anyone to carry and use. The devices are attached to signs that include location information for directing emergency responders, and the tube has printed instructions on how to use it. Ideally, a rescuer using the tube would swim out to the person in distress and have them hang onto the tube. If the rescuer is a strong swimmer, they can bring them ashore. Otherwise, both the rescuer and swimmer in distress can just hang onto the tube and float until a additional rescuers come to help.
Just a month after the tubes were installed at Pensacola Beach in April 2025, a local fisherman named Andrew Smith was able to deploy a rescue tube to save a teenage swimmer in distress. In addition to the successful save, the incident made news because of the way he managed to reach her with the tube. Smith was getting ready to fish with the assistance of a drone to spot his prey below. When he noticed the girl in trouble, he attached the rescue tube to his drone and flew the tube back to the swimmer. The first attempt missed, but he and bystanders grabbed a second tube, which he dropped right next to her. She was able to grab it and start floating, safely making it ashore. Smith’s creative quick thinking has reinforced the many reasons lifeguards around the country may utilize drones for rescue operations.
If you have kids or visitors heading towards the beach this season, let them know about rescue tubes and how they work. They could save a life! For more information, a video showing how they work, and ways to get them installed, visit the Rescue Tube Foundation out of Hawaii, where the idea originated. According to the foundation, over 700 tubes have been placed in locations throughout North America, resulting in more than 400 successful rescues since 2008.
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