It is not a time during which "guess what" is the most comforting thing to hear, but the story of an unlikely lifeguarding save over the weekend had a streak of heartwarming charm from "guess what" stories of days gone by.
"Early in the morning on Saturday, there weren't a lot of swimmers and we were all still in our sweats because it was a bit colder," recalled Alyssa Kneeland, 21, who has been working as a lifeguard since she was 16 and, because of Covid, is taking the semester off from Flagler College in Florida, where she studies painting and printmaking.
The call came in that a dog lost at sea needed rescuing. He was 300 yards out between Egypt and Wiborg's Beaches and "it looked like he was going to go down," dispatch said.
Ms. Kneeland's captain at Main Beach told her to launch the Jet Ski. "I was the only one there fit to drive it. I was certified last summer through Jet Ski training, but this was my first real experience," she said, "and of course it's a dog."
With one of her team's "best rookies," Aiden Cooper, a senior at East Hampton High School, on the back, Ms. Kneeland was on the scene in less than three minutes. Mr. Cooper explained that due to policy from a new village trustee, they already had the vehicle down at the beach, which saved time.
"I was so surprised," she said. "Usually when we get called they exaggerate the distance, but I was riding the ski just past where the waves were forming and my rescue swimmer [Mr. Cooper] pointed 300 to 350 yards offshore!"
Mr. Cooper directed Ms. Kneeland to the "tiniest little speck", which turned out to be a man in a kayak, who had his arms wrapped around the dog, a water-dog mix. The "decent sized" pup was "panicking beyond belief," whimpering, crying, and trying to jump off the kayak.
The lifeguards did not get the kayaker's name, but the man told them that when he reached the dog, it "was about to go under."
Initially the plan was to get the dog on the Jet Ski, but the kayaker was worried he would flip the kayak, so Mr. Cooper, atop the sled on the back of the Jet Ski, grabbed the kayak and slowly towed them in to shore.
Once they got close, Mr. Cooper said he tried to get off the ski, but the kayak flipped and the dog "jumped right out and swam really fast to shore," clearly finished with the whole ordeal.
Back on shore, Mr. Cooper was able to get a sense of what had happened before the call came to him and Ms. Kneeland.
Apparently, the dog's owner had initially approached Bill McKee, the Maidstone Club's beach manager, about the situation. Mr. McKee mobilized his son, Kyle, who enlisted help from a beachgoer with a kayak. The dog's owner also hailed down Kevin Bunce, a colleague of Ms. Kneeland's and Mr. Cooper's, who was on quad patrol at the time.
The woman had been "screaming that her dog drowned," Mr. Cooper said, so Mr. Bunce and Kyle McKee swam out, accompanied by the kayaker, feeling around in the sand for the dog, which had inexplicably started swimming out to sea. When they saw the dog struggling, they helped get it into the kayak.
The owner was "so relieved, she was very thankful, and pretty shocked" to see her dog again, Mr. Cooper said. The lifeguards never got her name.
The whole rescue took about 15 minutes and despite the hairy situation, was a simple, straightforward save. "Not really anything went wrong other than the kayak flipping," said Mr. Cooper.
What surprised Ms. Kneeland the most was "how he even got that far out! Maybe he was chasing something or got caught in a rip current like everyone else who comes out here in the summer," she said.
"Usually we close the beaches earlier in the season, but because of the virus, we extended our season. I'm happy that we were able to stay at the beach longer," Ms. Kneeland said, relieved they had been there to help. "Even at the end of the season, it's cold and it's slow, but we're still here and trying to help people."
