Parenting and personal responsibility
The company that owns Great America now requires life vests in all pools at all its parks for children less than 4 feet tall, in response to the tragic drowning earlier this week.
The mother and park officials dispute how many lifeguards were on duty at the time. And, with the caveat that all I know about this is what I've read, still, irony alert:
"I want this to be known," Flores said between sobs. "I want to warn all parents that they need to watch their kids at all times, because (Great America) doesn't do their job."
A sort of obvious followup question is, where were you while this was going on?
Flores said she had not been in the pool with her son at the time and does not know how he drowned. The 4-year-old had been in the water earlier, got out to eat some chips and went back in, she said.
When he didn't return within 10 minutes, she said, she became concerned and told her daughter to find him.
Then there's this:
Great America has no age or height requirements for children at the wave pool. "We do recommend that children under 4 feet tall use life vests, and we have them readily available," Frugé said. "There is no official rule that requires it."
Carlos was 4 feet tall, his mother said. He was not wearing a vest but might not have been required to if the recommended height rule were mandatory.
That sounded off to me, so I looked it up: a height of 4 feet would put him two inches over the 95th percentile even for a 5-year-old, according to the CDC growth chart. Granted, I've never met them, I'm just some asshole on the Internet taking potshots in a time of tragedy, so maybe he really was that tall.
The mother and park officials dispute how many lifeguards were on duty at the time. And, with the caveat that all I know about this is what I've read, still, irony alert:
"I want this to be known," Flores said between sobs. "I want to warn all parents that they need to watch their kids at all times, because (Great America) doesn't do their job."
A sort of obvious followup question is, where were you while this was going on?
Flores said she had not been in the pool with her son at the time and does not know how he drowned. The 4-year-old had been in the water earlier, got out to eat some chips and went back in, she said.
When he didn't return within 10 minutes, she said, she became concerned and told her daughter to find him.
Then there's this:
Great America has no age or height requirements for children at the wave pool. "We do recommend that children under 4 feet tall use life vests, and we have them readily available," Frugé said. "There is no official rule that requires it."
Carlos was 4 feet tall, his mother said. He was not wearing a vest but might not have been required to if the recommended height rule were mandatory.
That sounded off to me, so I looked it up: a height of 4 feet would put him two inches over the 95th percentile even for a 5-year-old, according to the CDC growth chart. Granted, I've never met them, I'm just some asshole on the Internet taking potshots in a time of tragedy, so maybe he really was that tall.
