Florida officials announced plans to review whether the firing of a lifeguard who left his "zone" to save a swimmer was justified.
Tomas Lopez, 21, was fired on Monday after leaving his lifeguard station to help a man who was drowning in an unprotected area of Hallandale Beach. The man was being sucked in by waves in a "swim at your own risk" area, almost 1,500 feet away from the area lifeguards are responsible for patrolling.
According to the Orlando Sun Sentinel, Lopez and a nurse helped the man until paramedics got there. The 21-year-old victim is currently recovering at a local hospital.
"I was on stand, and guests came up to me and told me there was someone drowning, that people were screaming and so I started running in the direction," Lopez told NBC Miami. "I ran out to do the job I was trained to do-I didn't think about it at all."
After Lopez was fired, two fellow lifeguards quit in protest of what they thought was an unjust punishment for Lopez's heroism.
"We are not a fire-rescue operation," Jeff Ellis, head of the company that manages the lifeguards, told the Orlando Sun Sentinel. "We are strictly a lifeguard organization-we limit what we do to the protected swimming zones that we've agreed to service."
Lopez's supervisor, Susan Ellis, told WPTV in support of the company's decision to fire Lopez, "We have liability issues and can't go out of the protected area, what he did was his own decision. He knew the company rules and did what he thought he needed to do."
The Hallandale Beach City Manager Renee Crichton seems to side with Lopez's actions, stating "we take safety of all visitors to our beaches very seriously, whether they are in a protected area or unprotected area, we believe aid must be rendered."
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