Nancy Baker: A daughter's drowning leads to pool safety reforms

Nancy Baker never envisioned becoming a leading advocate for safer pools and spas.  However, the tragic accident that killed her 7-year old daughter Graeme in 2002 prompted her to act. As she says, “It helps me make some sense of something that makes no sense at all. It was an utterly preventable and senseless death.”

Baker’s personal story, coupled with her tireless campaign to make sure such a tragedy doesn’t happen to others, is one of the chief reasons why Congress could soon enact a federal pool and spa safety bill named for Graeme. The bill, which would direct the Consumer Product Safety Commission to set an anti-entrapment safety standard for pool and spa covers, was passed by unanimous vote in the House in October and now awaits Senate action. The measure also encourages states, through financial incentives, to pass strong laws to require fences and anti-entrapment drain cover devices to reduce childhood drowning. Although the measure has strong bipartisan support, its fate is uncertain according to The Washington Post because the fiscal conservative Sen. Tom Coburn, (R-Okla.) has put a legislative hold on the measure, along with several dozen other bills, because they authorize new spending without offsetting that expense elsewhere in the federal budget.

Graeme Baker, who had been swimming unassisted since she was three, drowned after becoming trapped underwater by hundreds of pounds of suction force from a hot-tub drain. Graeme had gone to the graduation party of a family friend with her mother and four sisters, including her twin, Jackie. Soon after they arrived, one of Baker's daughters ran toward her and screamed, "Mommy! Mommy! Graeme is in the hot tub." Baker says: "I jumped in."

As she later testified in Congress: “It took two adults to pull her off this drain, the force so great that the cover of the drain cracked in half removing her.” 

Only days after her daughter’s death, her father-in-law, former Secretary of State James Baker, suggested that Nancy Baker take action. He said that the accident should never have happened to Graeme, nor should it happen to any child, she recalls. “Every day you get up looking for a child that’s gone. You ask yourself, ‘How in the world could I have prevented this from happening?’ ‘What could have been different?’" she says. "I found out a lot could have been different. I was angry about it. I’m still angry about it.”

Deep in grief, Nancy Baker soon started scanning the Internet to see if there were similar deaths. Slowly and sadly, she says, she began to “realize how many accidents had occurred—and how they were completely preventable.” And that’s when she began to make pool and hot-tub entrapment a national issue. She personally visited House and Senate members, making her case, eventually joining up with the nonprofit safety group SafeKids to push for anti-drowning measures.

As SafeKids notes on its Web site, drowning is the second accidental injury-related killer of children ages one to 14. Each year, there are about 260 drowning deaths of children younger than five in swimming pools. The numbers of entrapment deaths are far smaller: 33 children, 14 and younger, died from pool and spa entrapments between 1985 and 2004; another 100 were injured during the same time period.

Initially, Baker was told that the entrapment numbers were too low to merit Congress or regulatory action. But Baker was undeterred, especially when she realized that there were relatively simple fixes, including a safety vacuum release system that automatically shuts off the pump, releasing anyone who becomes entrapped.

Fortunately for consumers, Baker is translating her grief and anger into meaningful action. For that, we want to name Baker one of our safety crusaders joining the ranks of other parents who are trying to make sure that their misfortune doesn’t become ours. Read about: Janette Fennell, Kathy Fackler and Bob and Judy Lambert.

“I dream of a day when children swimming in a pool without four-sided barrier fencing and with drain systems capable of pinning a child underwater would be just as unthinkable as children riding in a car without car seats,” Baker says.
    So do we.
    Do you know any safety crusaders? Please let us know.

Comments

[Stacey]

Yes, there should have been adult supervision. But I have heard of too many instances where the adults were present and could not release the child from the drain. The suction was so strong that they could not pull the child free. I've also heard of children having their hair tangled in the drains. This has been for hot tubs AND regular pools.

The question is: what do parents look for when taking their children to pools? What should they know to keep their children out of pools with this suction problem? Are there warning signs or things you can check before your child gets in?

[Vicki]

I am so saddened that it takes the death of a child to finally take action in something so obviously a hazard to children's lives. This (safety vacuum release) should have been an absolute necessity from the initial construction of all pools and hot tubs. And how frightening that we, the naive consumer of fun, are completely unaware of the death threat we're enjoying with our kids. Entrapment numbers too low? Does it take the death of one of their own? This makes me sick. Way to go Nancy.
Mother of 4 & 1 yr olds

[Ron & Nancy Clawson]

Our 7 year old daughter was trapped on a drain in the spa in our back yard pool 31 years ago. We were fortunate that we were with her. The spa pump had to be turned off to get her off of the drain. She almost drowned and did have a HUGE hematoma on her buttocks that required a trip to the hosptial.

The pool builder said they had put the "wrong" drain cover on the drain and promptly replaced it. I'm amazed that this problem still persists.

We are sorry for your loss and completely understand your grief and outrage at this situation.

[WM]

It's so viscerally disheartening to read of such a profound tragedy. However, it's interesting how this article tries glossing over that this young girl was barely beyond toddlerhood, "swimming unassisted since she was three." A competent parent doesn't consider leaving a small child unassisted in more than 1 inch of water--ever. Do we need laws that say you can't leave a child in the woods overnight in the middle of winter? If you want 10-foot hermetically-sealed fences and an anti-trap drain--you're free to purchase them--you really are--but please don't impose the costs of your infinite wisdom on me or other strangers.

[jeff f]

1) Those who complain about federal legislation and intrusion into much of private life (as I recall James Baker was a leading member of the GOP-- a party not known for advocating federal legislation on matters like this. It would end up being another addition to the slippery slope they have long condemned.
2) The real answer is that parents should tech/instruct their kids not to go into hot tubs without the parent in the tub (the same as swimming pools) PARTICULARLY HOT TUBS IN OTHER PEOPLE'S HOMES. Federal laws are no substitute for intelligent parenting.

[Berniece Dunnagan]

They can't pass these safety regulations soon enough!