VICTORIA’S Water Police has increased the number of officers patrolling waterways as the summer season sees more and more people taking to rivers and lakes.
Following what Victoria Police has described as a spike in deaths in the 2013-14 year, officers are monitoring waterways and warning those using them to take care.
Of the 65 officers operating as the Water Police Squad who attend emergencies on Victorian waterways across the state, as many as two patrol the Swan Hill district at any one time.
Water Police Squad sergeant George Dixon said with summer in full swing officers were patrolling waterways in higher numbers, but he downplayed concerns surrounding water safety.
Sergeant Dixon refuted claims there had been a “spate of deaths”, noting there had been two in total on lakes and rivers in the state in the last month.
Two drowning deaths in the Swan Hill area in the last month, one a 6-year-old boy and the other a kayaker, happened on the Murray River which is the jurisdiction of New South Wales Marine Command.
For more on this story, pick up a copy of Wednesday’s Guardian (January 7).
