Responsibility

We went to the beach today at Camber Sands. This is wonderful beach – very flat and very safe for young children. In addition to the beach there are large sand dunes – with lots of opportunities for games and playing.

Around three o’clock a blue land rover came trundling over the sands. A man climbed out and solemnly raised a red flag. The land rover then climbed between two sand dunes and disappeared.

There is a warning system on the beach with an orange flag to warn of an off shore wind – and then inflatables should not be used. A red flag warns of danger in swimming.

A group of four children were playing in the water with a yellow ball. It was hardly possible to see the red flag from where the children were. In any case I am sure that it did not enter their mind to look for a flag being raised as warning.

This is one of these situations where as an adult you don’t know if you should interfere or not. There were no adults within a twenty minute walk of the children. The tide was going out and the ledge was clearly deeper with occasional channels. I walked towards them through the surprisingly warm water.

Two men made their way across the sand towards the children and separated the two younger children but left the two older ones in the water. The men then started walking back to their group – taking the two younger ones with them. The red flag kept blowing in the wind.

Perhaps the men had local knowledge.

I would have liked to have done more but did not want to appear as an interfering busybody.

I wonder what you would have done?