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Toddler falls into pool and becomes his own hero thanks to survival swimming classes
There's nearly nothing more terrifying than your small child falling into a body of water when you're not looking. It's something that parents have nightmares about while some parents are left grieving that nightmare becoming reality. Accidents around pools are very common, resulting in massive public safety announcements about ways to keep kids safe around bodies of water.There are initiatives ranging from discouraging parents from using Puddle Jumpers to making sure parents know to avoid putting blue bathing suits on children. Blue bathing suits makes it harder for people to see if a child has gone under water and the popular Puddle Jumpers give kids false confidence and teaches them improper form for swimming. But one of the most important message to parents has been to make sure your children know basic water safety skills and learn to swim. Typically when small children fall into a pool while briefly unsupervised they panic causing them to quickly become submerged, sinking to the bottom of the pool. The drowning child is then only rescued if a parent, caregiver, older sibling or family dog sees them and jumps into action. But for one San Diego family, their 17-month old knew exactly what to do when he was running by the pool and fell inside. The entire thing was caught on home surveillance camera, piquing interest in the life saving swim lessons.
girl in white tank top on swimming pool during daytime
Photo by Rendy Novantino on Unsplash
Little Frankie had been taking Infant Self Rescue (ISR) water safety training for months where the instructor teaches babies how to prepare for falling into water before righting themselves and floating. Watching the video you can see the training immediately kick in as the boy realizes he's going into the water. He immediately takes a deep breath as he's falling. While his little feet were above his head he didn't panic, he maneuvered his body until he could safely turn over to take a breath.The baby floats on his back until his father sees him. Frankie's dad runs to his side only to stop for a minute in shock that his son was perfectly fine. He saved himself from a possible deadly situation by doing exactly what he was taught to do through those survival swim lessons.
boy in red t-shirt playing with water
Photo by Yianni Mathioudakis on Unsplash
"I immediately thought, 'oh my gosh, he did exactly what he was taught to do," Frankie's mom says in part to Fox 5 San Diego. "He did what he was supposed to do and those lessons were invaluable."The instructor for the ISR classes says he has been inundated with class sign ups after the story of Frankie got out. Witnessing the training save a small child in a real-life situation that could've ended in tragedy encouraged parents to take this type of training more seriously. Thanks to the toddler's months of training, falling into the pool didn't cause him any fear around falling into the pool. The little guy might have thought it was just another part of his training, especially since his dad didn't panic and pulled the boy out of the pool quickly. ISR lessons can be cost prohibitive but community centers and places like the YMCA offer swim lessons for people of all ages, including infants. They're not the same type of lessons but they all teach water safety, including floating. Learning how to be comfortable in and around water to include some basic water survival skills will help children have safer experiences around water.