Between the Flags

Australia has developed an integrated cost-effective, coastal rescue and surveillance network. To guard swimmers too confident in their abilities to overcome the waves and the sea, are 7,000 lifesavers trained volunteer club members patrolling almost every beach in the country. Surf lifesavers have performed over 500,000 rescues since they began in the early 1900s. They volunteer their time, marking the safest places to swim with red and yellow flags and giving the swimmers the confidence to enjoy the surf. They are ordinary people doing an extraordinary job.