VOLUSIA COUNTY, Fla. – There’s still time left to enjoy the holiday weekend, and should you spend some of that time at the beach, but it’s important to keep water safety in mind.
According to the Volusia Beaches app, red flag conditions were posted on Sunday.
News 6 spoke to one family from Douglas, Georgia, who has visited several beaches throughout Florida this summer including Fernandina, St. Augustine, and now, Daytona.
Deena Mears said she and her family are not only familiar with the beach flag system, they’re also mindful of how far they go out into the ocean.
“Because of our ages, and we’ve got a one year old, most of our water time is between the ankle and the knee,” Mears said.
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Mears said there is plenty to enjoy on land, so they prefer to either stay in the sand, or stay in shallow water.
“We don’t go out there,” Mears said. “We watch other people and we think, ‘Oh they need to come back in,’ because we’ve been in riptides before, and we just don’t go out there. We enjoy just the edge of the water.”
On Volusia Beach Safety’s website, it says daily beach flag warnings can be found on their base towers, each county beachfront park, all beach approaches, lifeguard stations and the Volusia Beaches app.
The Volusia Beaches app not only lets you check current beach conditions including flag warnings and rip current risks, but it also shows you where lifeguards are stationed.
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Mears said their family takes into account where the lifeguards are on patrol when picking a spot on the beach.
“We watch both color flags to see when the flags change and yesterday, they did change and we were like, ‘Oh, what happened?’” Mears said. “‘You know, what’s going on?’ So we watch the flags of the lifeguards and people need to do that because they’re there for our safety.”
You can download the Volusia Beaches app and people are encouraged to check social media for updates from Volusia Beach Safety.
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