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Lifeguarding at Jones Beach is more than fun in the sun and on the sand
Passing the Jones Beach rookie lifeguard test was easy, said North Woodmere resident Adam Nussen, who was among more than 100 hopefuls who competed for a lifeguard job on June 12. Getting offered one of those jobs was the hard part.
This wasn’t the first time Nussen, 23, had taken the grueling, four-part test. He passed it in 2008 and worked for the Jones Beach Lifeguard Corps that year, but he spent the summer of 2009 as the head lifeguard in Atlantic Beach and last summer in Long Beach, Calif., so he had to take the rookie test again this year.
He was one of 75 people who passed it. The survivors were ranked based on the points they accrued. The faster they swam and ran, the more points they earned. Only the top 28 finishers were offered jobs at Jones Beach or one of seven other state parks patrolled by its lifeguards, and Nussen ranked 10th overall.
“I’ve been swimming since I was little and was on the Hewlett High School swim team,” he said. “I’ve competed in open-water events and triathlons. On June 5 in Middlebury, Connecticut, I competed in my first Half Iron Man competition.”
Cary Epstein, a health teacher at Hewlett High and Woodmere Middle School, the girls’ varsity swim coach at Hewlett and a 14-year lifeguard at Jones Beach, cheered Nussen on while he took the test.
The test consists of a 100-yard pool swim, a 50-yard cross-chest rescue, a 400-yard ocean swim and a three-quarter-mile beach run.
“The four components are extremely competitive,” Epstein said. “Jones Beach is a competitive place to work. It’s not one of those stereotypical lazy beaches where lifeguards can lay back and kick their feet up. We make a lot of rescues.”
Nussen, a lifeguard at the Hofstra Swim Center and head coach of the Great Neck club team, began five days of Jones Beach lifeguard training last Saturday. He and his fellow rookies learned the finer points of ocean rescues and other emergencies as well as day-to-day beach operations, first aid and cardiopulmonary resuscitation.
Jones Beach opens each morning at 9 a.m. and closes at 8 p.m., and, Nussen explained, lifeguards must not only open and close all the lifeguard stands, but make sure people are out of the water before the beach closes.
