International Life Saving (ILS) is bringing together experience from across the lifesaving community to help shape a stronger international approach to Public Rescue Equipment (PRE).
PRE can play an important role in drowning prevention by providing flotation and rescue aids to people in difficulty, while also supporting safer bystander rescue. However, PRE is only effective when it is right for the environment, easy to recognise, simple to use, well maintained, and when it is supported by clear signage, user instructions and governance. To help address this, an ILS Public Rescue Equipment Guidelines Working Group has been established to develop internationally applicable, evidence-informed guidance for PRE.
Formed under the governance of ILS, at the behest of Erik Bech from the Danish Water Safety Council and Adam Wooler from the ILS Drowning Prevention Commission, the Working Group brings together contributors with practical and research experience from a range of countries and programmes. Its purpose is to help organisations, authorities and risk managers decide whether PRE should be provided, where it should be located, what type may be most appropriate for the environment, as well as how it should be signed, maintained and governed. This information is crucial to ensure that PRE is more likely to be available, usable and effective to assist when needed for bystander rescues while minimising rescuer risk.
The group includes contributors connected to several organisations with established PRE programmes or related work, including:
- Surf Life Saving Australia
- Surf Life Saving New Zealand
- Water Safety Ireland
- Drowning Prevention Aotearoa
- Royal National Lifeboat Institution (RNLI) / National Water Safety Forum – UK
- The Rescue Tube Foundation – USA
- National Sea Rescue Institution (NSRI) – South Africa
This international collaboration is important because these organisations have already contributed valuable national programmes, guidance and operational learning. The RNLI helped establish an early benchmark for coastal PRE guidance in the United Kingdom, while Water Safety Ireland developed a long-standing national life ring programme. The Rescue Tube Foundation, that has its origins in Hawaii has also contributed an important evidence base through published research, which reported no fatal rescuer drownings related to public rescue tube use after their 2008 introduction in Kauai and observed a reduction in rescuer drowning associated with deployment. The NSRI’s Pink Rescue Buoy programme has built strong public recognition in South Africa, while Surf Life Saving New Zealand and Drowning Prevention Aotearoa have developed more recent evidence-informed guidance for the New Zealand coast. Surf Life Saving Australia is contributing current operational and research perspectives as this international work develops. Through ILS, this experience can now be brought together and shared more widely for the benefit of communities around the world.
Importantly, the Terms of Reference set out an overarching, environment-based framework rather than a single device-based approach. This means the work is intended to be relevant across a range of aquatic settings, including beaches and coastlines, rock platforms, headlands, jetties and harbour walls, inland still waters (such as lakes) and inland moving waters such as rivers. While detailed outputs may be developed in stages, the overall ambition is to create a practical international framework that can be applied across different environments and contexts, as well as both High-Income Countries and Low and Middle-Income Countries.
For ILS, this matters because PRE sits firmly within the wider goal of reducing drowning through practical, evidence-informed action. By connecting international experience, research and operational learning, ILS has an opportunity to help shape a clearer and more practical approach to PRE worldwide. The aim is not to promote one product or one national model, but to help communities and organisations develop PRE systems that are better matched to their environment, easier for the public to use, and more effective in an emergency.
The Terms of Reference also make clear that this is intended to be a staged programme of work. The initial emphasis is on a practical framework and the signposting of international best practice. In the medium term, this may be supported by education and public awareness resources. In the longer term, and subject to the maturity of the evidence base and support within ILS, the work may progress toward more prescriptive recommendations and a pathway toward more formal international standardisation, potentially including an ISO standard for PRE.