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American Morning

Interview with Rob Polley

Aired June 14, 2002 - 07:43   ET

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
PAULA ZAHN, CNN ANCHOR: The recent drowning death of a seven- year-old boy at a birthday party in California is a tragic reminder that backyard swimming pools, any swimming pool for that matter, can be a very dangerous place for young children.

Some frightening figures now: Drowning is the second leading cause of unintentional injury death for children four and under. On average, 350 children under the age of five die in pools every year. And now with school letting out for the summer, parents need to be even more careful.

And this morning the president of Swim America, Rob Polley, is going to give us some important lessons about pool safety. Rob is poolside in Westpoint, Connecticut on a chilly morning indeed, and we'll be talking with him throughout the show. Good to see you, Rob -- welcome.

ROB POLLEY, PRESIDENT, SWIM AMERICA: Thanks, Paula -- glad to be here.

ZAHN: So, Rob, I guess most of us who have children would like to think that we do everything humanly possible to make sure our kids are safe at the pool. But what kinds of mistakes do we routinely make?

POLLEY: Well, the most important mistake that we make is that we take our attention off for even a second. For example, I was at a pool recently, where a little boy was walking about ten steps behind his mom. He jumped in, and she kept walking. It took about 20 seconds for her to realize -- and it wasn't a tragedy. She ended up realizing that he had jumped in. She got him. His lips were barely above the water. There were five adults standing with in five feet of him, and they didn't see him. And really, the attention is the most important factor that we have for pool safety with children.

ZAHN: And you find that in most cases, these kids are gone for fewer than five minutes, right, that drown?

POLLEY: Well, yes. Most children who drown, drown in home pools. They are missing for less than five seconds -- sorry -- less than five minutes. And they are generally five years old or younger. It can happen so quickly that diligence is the most important thing in preventing it.

ZAHN: So why don't you walk us through the paces of what else we can do to ensure our kids are safe.

POLLEY: Great. The American Swimming Coaches Association actually has a swim lesson program, and that's one of the -- it's called Swim America, and that's one of the ways of preventing drowning. Of course, it's to teach your children to swim.

But before that, you can actually deny them access to the pool through a number of products. We all know that we are supposed to have fences around our pool with self-closing, self-latching gates that close and latch by themselves every time. There are also some specialty fences.

And there is a pool cover that we are going to look at now, and this is a pool cover that you would actually put on and take off between swims. It is very, very easy to use, and that makes it something that you would use. I am just going to go over and turn the key, and this pool cover takes about 30 seconds to close. This is actually something that, you know, I am going to go swimming. You take the cover off. I am finished swimming. You put the cover back on. It's good to know also that when this cover is on, your family could actually stand on it, and they would not fall into the pool.

ZAHN: I was wondering about that. You also make it very clear that parents have got to make sure that they don't leave toys scattered around, lawn chairs near the fence, where a kid could climb the fence. You don't want to make that easy for them, do you?

POLLEY: Exactly. And now, all of the fences that you would install are sort of unclimbable. They are usually made out of some sort of mesh, not the Hurricane Fence as you would normally have, because they can climb over and they can step on a chair, and they will. And so you have to be very, very diligent with not leaving things around the pool.

ZAHN: And do you believe in pool alarms?

POLLEY: Well, as part of an overall water safety system, yes. But by themselves -- they are sort of car alarms. People tend to ignore them, because they are set too sensitively. And so if you ignore it, of course, it's not -- there is no value in it at all.

ZAHN: Well, we are going to get back into the water a little bit later on with you this morning. Rob Polley, thank you for your excellent advice -- appreciate your help.

POLLEY: Thanks.

ZAHN: See you in a little bit.

POLLEY: Thanks, Paula.

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