
Water safety and drowning
Every year, in the UK, around 400 people die from drowning as a result of an accident in or around water.
There are thousands of individuals who survive drowning events but who are left with severe, and often permanent, life-changing injuries. Our search, rescue and emergency services respond to over 100,000 water-related rescue, and flood events annually. All of these place huge burdens on families, individuals and society.
Many of these deaths are as a result of simple everyday mistakes, such as a trip or fall into water, or misjudgments such as underestimating the effect of swimming in cold open water unprepared can have. Others result from inherently risky activities including jumping/tombstoning from a great height into water.