Calls for greater beach safety as UK holiday makers are urged to be careful

Their bodies were back in the UK yesterday with funerals expected to be carried out later this week.
Questions as to why the steps down to the bay which George and Louis used were not closed off considering there was a warning sign up on the beach urging people not to go swimming have been raised.

From the steps, the Selby family, or anyone else for that matter, would not have seen the sign as it was facing the opposite direction to alert people reaching the beach from the car park.

It was from the bottom of the steps where Louis was swept away by a large wave.
And yesterday, The Royal National Lifeboat Institution (RNLI) highlighted the dangers of rip currents, which account for 40% of environmental-related incidents their crews respond to each year.

Twelve Britons - including seven children - have drowned in the last month alone.
Rip currents are fast-moving channels of water pushing swimmers out to sea and beyond their depth. The fastest rips can drag victims away at two-and-a-half metres per second.

On Monday afternoon a mother in her 50s drowned after being swept out to sea when she went to the rescue of her two sons, aged 11 and 13.
The boys had got into difficulties after being caught by a strong rip current off Northcott Mouth Beach, Cornwall.
In August, four-year-old Dylan Cecil drowned after falling from a jetty at Burnham-on-Sea, Somerset.
His mother Rachel described how he fell into a “whirlpool” and how she knew immediately she would never see her son again despite her efforts to save him.

Dylan's body was discovered four days after he went missing, half-a-mile from where he was last seen.
And, a few weeks later last Saturday, seven-year-old Louis Selby drowned along with his father George who could not swim but nevertheless leapt into the water to try and rescue his son.

In Portugal, five-year-old Lara Lewis drowned after being swept out to sea near the port of Nazare while she was collecting seashells.
Her grandfather also died after diving into the water to try and save her.
Sam Capper, 15, was washed into the sea by a sudden wave while he was fishing on slippery rocks at Llangennith, Wales, and in Thailand, 47-year-old British tourist Peter Cook drowned after getting into difficulties in the water with his wife and children at Patong Beach.

He had pushed his family to safety but was dragged out to sea by the current.
Also in August, a father and his two young sons drowned after their canoe capsized at a Highland sea loch.
Ewen Beaton, 32, and his sons Jamie, two, and five-year-old Ewen, were thrown into the water off the shores of Gairloch in northwest Scotland.
A third passenger, five-year-old Grace Mackay, was recovered from the water but later died in hospital.
Peter Dawes, RNLI head of lifeguards, said: “Anyone who gets caught in a rip should try to remain calm and raise their arm in the air to signal for help. “If they feel they can swim, they should swim parallel to the beach until free of the current, and then head for shore. “We strongly recommend that anyone heading to the beach should choose a lifeguarded beach and swim between the red and yellow flags. “We also urge people to remember their own safety. If they see someone else in trouble in the water, it's a natural instinct to try to help if you see another person in danger. “But the safest course of action is to alert a lifeguard or dial 999 and ask for the coastguard. Trying to carry out a rescue yourself can often mean you're endangering your own life.”