After Sadie celebrated her 3rd birthday this year, I thought differently about the family’s annual trips to Florida. At that age, it was easy for her to venture alone into the swimming pool at my parents’ summer house.
We are a beach-loving couple who raised our daughter to be comfortable around water. It was only a matter of time before she gets drawn to my mother’s newly Victorian tiled pool so I wasted no time in looking into pool safety devices.
Along came my next door buddy, singing the praises of the Pool Protector pool alarm. It makes a loud and vibrating sound whenever someone jumps into the pool because its electronic detector can sense activity in the water.
It alarms twice, to my amazement, from the gadget itself and from a remote receiver that can be positioned at a distance of up to 200 feet from the unit. It makes sense that youngsters are going to need pool safety if they are that far away from an adult.
Indeed, I heard a ringing one weekend we were about to head out to brunch. I could see Sadie in her bedroom with her mom but the sound was clearly coming from the alarm speaker in the room we parents occupied.
I ran downstairs to see what triggered the Pool Protector pool alarm. It turned out to be the son of my very neighbor who recommended this pool safety product.
He and his wife had been in the front porch, chatting with my mother, when their 6 year old son walked off without their knowledge. He had just begun learning how to swim. Fortunately, I extracted him from the water before he could drown.
I reckon too many young lives have been lost to an unsupervised pool. As much as we mean to keep our children secure at all times, swimming pool safety is just not top of mind. No parent can bear losing a child to a slip-up.
Mikeal Gravette has been training people how to use self defense products to defend themselves and their property for years. There are a number of options, like stun guns, pepper sprays and personal alarms. He offers full support and instruction on how to use the products.