Ras Al Khaimah: When Yazan Wasef kissed his mother Ahlam on a balmy Thursday afternoon and left for a game of football, little did she realise that this was the last time she would see her son alive.
Football was his life, Yazan wanted to join friends for a match on the beach in Ras Al Khaimah, but his father Wasef refused to let him go.
When Wasef, who is a businessman, left for office, Yazan cajoled his mother to let him go, she gave in after a while.
At the beach, Yazan's four friends were waiting, and they embarked on an engrossing game of football. When the ball fell in the sea, bubbly Yazan ran to fetch it, but the rocky terrain and strong undercurrents dragged the unsuspecting teenager deeper into the sea.
When his friends realised what was happening, it was too late. There were no lifeguards on the beach and no trained hands to help rescue Yazan from drowning.
"Had there been a life guard the teenager would not have lost his life," said a resident.
The drowning of the 15-year-old Jordanian boy on Ras Al Khaimah's old Corniche on May 6 has shed the light on the lack of the safety measures in this area, where no lifeguards are available in a rocky area.
The area is largely known for the football matches organised among the emirate's surrounding areas, and those matches take place in turn especially in the weekends where several teams approach this Corniche for their planned matches.
Young people in these areas have already provided what ended up a playground with electricity from their own houses to use the night time in their matches.
Busy schedule
Sources in the area said that nobody can imagine the busy schedule for the playground during Ramadan where tournaments are organised on these playgrounds.
Sources said that several playgrounds are set up in the area with goal being moved around to adjust according to the level of the sea water.
The sources said that this area of the Old RAK Corniche is in a big public demand especially from the youngsters who come to play there unsupervised except from the police vehicles who pass through the area.
The sources stressed that this area has been a big issue discussed by the emirate's concerned authorities whose usual response was that this area will be on the list of areas to be renovated in the future but so far nothing has been done as yet.
The residents of the area said that the despite the dangers facing the visitors to the area, the authorities have been only installed few signboards informing the visitors that certain rocky areas were not suitable for swimming and urging the public to avoid these areas.
The residents said that these rocks have not been removed from the area to spare the visitors the potential dangers they could easily face.
They stressed what made the situation even more dangerous was that the authorities have been taking sand from the area where the swimmers lose balance and drown due to the sudden drop.
The residents said that several drowning cases have been reported in the area in the past few years with an average of four to five people losing their lives, besides other accidents in the area.
Assigning a lifeguard
The residents called on the authorities to assign at least a lifeguard on the beach to help those who drown in the area, adding that in the case of Yazan, there were many people in the area but none of them took the risk to help him while he struggling in the water.
The people in the area called the authorities to help the drowning boy and waited for sometime for help to arrive but by the time they arrived the boy was already dead.
Residents said that the authorities could cordon off the dangerous areas so that visitors can reach them. They said that the streets in Old Cornish area itself is very dangerous as it is a crowded.
Do you think having lifeguards on every beach will prevent accidents? What more can be done to make sure that beaches are safe?
