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Asbury Park beach lifeguard impaled by a six-foot-long umbrella in ‘freak’ wind accident
A lifeguard was injured at the Jersey Shore when a beach umbrella struck her amid strong winds.
A female lifeguard was impaled by a beach umbrella at the Jersey Shore this week, which became a dangerous projectile due to wind gusts.
The young woman was struck by a roughly six-foot-long umbrella that pierced through her body, entering beneath her left shoulder and exiting through her back around 9:30 AM on Wednesday at Asbury Park’s 3rd Avenue Beach.
“The umbrella went underneath her left shoulder and out the back,” said Asbury Park Fire Chief Kevin Keddy in a statement to The New York Post. “It was protruding by about a foot,” he added.
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Probe how beach umbrella became almost fatal
Emergency responders, including fellow lifeguards and EMS personnel, rushed to the scene after a call came in.
“We had to saw off the stake from the front and the back to make it more manageable. We bandaged her up and transported her to the hospital,” Keddy said.
The victim, conscious throughout the ordeal, was taken to the Jersey Shore University Medical Centre in Neptune.
“When we dropped her off, she was conscious and alert and in good spirits — all things considered,” Keddy added.
There is still no accurate way of knowing how the accident happened. One reason that has been put forward is that the woman might have been attempting to get or pick up an umbrella that had been snagged by a strong wind blast when she fell on the stake.
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Umbrellas turning into airborne hazards are not new
U.S. Consumer Product Safety Commission (CPSC) reported that about 3, 000 individuals suffer injuries every year, due to beach umbrellas.
Notably, a 63-year-old woman named Tammy Perreault was impaled by a beach umbrella in 2022 in South Carolina. In the same way, 55-year-old Lottie Michelle Belk also died in Virginia Beach in 2016 when a windblown umbrella hit her.
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CPSC's 2024 report also warns that flying beach umbrellas have become “too common” in the States and urges beachgoers to take precautions.
