Lifeguards play a key role in ensuring a safe environment for swimmers at pools and public beaches, says the YMCA of Greater Monmouth County. (Photo by Joshua Reed.)
It’s now the busy season at beaches, pools, and lakes, and the YMCA of Greater Monmouth County is reminding parents, caregivers, and everyone in our community to make water safety a priority.
A new water-safety sign was installed Wednesday at Red Bank’s Maple Cove, a popular Navesink River put-in spot for kayakers and canoeists.
With the help of Councilwoman Cindy Burnham, the sign was donated by the parents of David Civile, right, a 26-year-old Tinton Falls man who disappeared while kayaking in the Shrewsbury River off Little Silver in November, 2010. His remains were found two years later.
Signs donated by the David P. Civile Foundation for Boating Safety Awareness have also been installed in Little Silver, Fair Haven, Rumson and elsewhere in Monmouth County.
Read more about the foundation’s efforts here. (Photo above by John T. Ward. Click to enlarge)
One of the signs that Joan Civile has offered to the town as part of a campaign inspired by the death of her son, David, below. (Click to enlarge)
By JOHN T. WARD
Four years after a Tinton Falls man disappeared while kayaking in the Shrewsbury River off Little Silver, his mother is on a campaign to ensure nothing like that happens again.
David Civile was 26 years old, “in great shape,” and excited about the kayak he’d purchased just three weeks earlier, his mother, Joan Civile, told the Red Bank council Monday night. The November morning that he put in at Little Silver Point Road, he’d just purchased waterproof pants.
“He just thought he was safe,” she recalled. “He said, ‘Mom, I’m in a river. If it’s bad, I’ll just come back.'”