Drowning doesn’t look like you’d expect: Here’s how to protect yourself

Do you know what drowning looks like?

The popular image of underwater death - characterised by thrashing arms and legs, yelling, and desperate signalling for help - is everywhere in movies and on TV.

But victims mostly slip under the surface unnoticed, a leading water safety organisation has warned.

“Drowning doesn't look like it does in the films,” warns Guy Addington, South East Water Safety lead at the Royal National Lifeboat Institution.

“Somebody thrashing around and shouting - they could be in serious distress, but they're not drowning.

“Drowning can be unnoticed, silent and not seen until it's way too late.”

Noiseless drownings happen with “alarming frequency,” Addington cautions.

But you can protect yourself - and others - from this fate by following a few simple tips.

Every year, around 140 people die by drowning around the UK coast. If you include the number of fatalities at inland sites and pools, this grim figure climbs to more than 400.

Across the EU, more than 5,000 people die this way each year.

Part of the problem is a misapprehension about how people drown, Addington explains.

“Drowning very often looks nothing like you would expect it to look like,” he says.

“Drowning is water entering the airway and choking [it] up. And once you've got water in the airway, you can make no noise.”

In addition to working for the RNLI, Addington has volunteered for the Margate life boating station since he was just 17. Over nearly three decades at the station, he has helped thousands of people in trouble at sea.

Drowning is so dangerous because victims usually can’t signal for attention, he explains.

“A very recent example involved a four-year-old girl who went missing at a beach location,” he says.

“She was found subsurface in a coastal