Lopez said he was at his stand Monday afternoon when someone alerted him to a man flailing in the water about 1,500 feet away — a zone where people must swim at their own risk. “It was a long run, but someone needed my help. I wasn’t going to say no,” Lopez told the Sun-Sentinel. By the time the lifeguard arrived to the scene, the 21-year-old victim had already been pulled to the shore, according to the newspaper. Lopez and an off-duty nurse helped care for the semi-unconscious man until first responders got there.
After the rescue, Lopez filled out an incident report, then he was fired after he admitted to abandoning his territory. When his colleagues found out he was dumped, four of them resigned in protest. “What was he supposed to do? Watch a man drown?” former colleague Szilard Janko asked the Sun-Sentinel. Two others also were fired because they didn’t want to agree to the company’s policy.
City officials of Hallandale Beach didn’t take sides, but said in a statement that “whether (swimmers) are in a protected area or unprotected area, we believe aid must be rendered.” Lopez, meanwhile, said he has accepted his fate. “I was prepared for it,” he told NBC 6 Miami. “It wasn’t too much of an upset because I had my morals intact over my job.”
Lol Florida
-- Not changing this sig until I decide to change this sig. Started: July 6, 2005