Two young children play on a sunny Sunday morning with a bucket and scoops on a beach on the Waal. “Actually, I think: oh, don’t do that,” says Helian Loijer (52), board member of the Tiel Rescue Brigade. The beaches are loved by the inhabitants of Tiel: as an outlet for the dog, to turn off the rod or to bathe for a while. On a warm day, the temptation is great for swimming in the river. Dangerous, the members of the Rescue Brigade know.
The number of drowning due to an accident increased last year for the third year in a row, according to new figures from the Central Bureau of Statistics (CBS). In 2024, 146 people drowned, 39 who are not registered in the Netherlands, such as tourists and temporary labor migrants. The number of drowning was not that high in the last ten years, although it came close in 2023, 2020 and 2018.
Almost one in five drowning happens at home, for example in the bathtub. In three -quarters of the cases, people drown in open water, so in a river, canal, recreational lake or in the sea – after a fall or while swimming. Other cases fall into the other or unknown category.
A swimming ban applies to the Waal, except for a few designated swimming spots. Yet things regularly go wrong. Last month three young men drowned in the river in various incidents.
De Waal has a particularly strong flow, the ferry sails through it
A 29-year-old man from Fijnaart in Brabant got into trouble on June 21 when he was swimming in a gravel hole, a lake formed by sand extraction, located on the river.
Eight days later a 21-year-old man from Poland drowned in another part of the Waal. The man stood to throw a ball into the water until his waist when he went under. An eyewitness told De Gelderlander: “I looked straight at him. Saw the panic in his eyes. I still shouted: turn you on your back! But he couldn’t understand me.” A day later the man’s body washed up, some thirty kilometers away, near Haaften.
Three days later, a 25-year-old Romanian drowned in Zaltbommel, near a beach on the river.
Strong current
De Waal has a particularly strong current. The ferry that brings cyclists and pedestrians from Tiel to the other side of the river every twenty minutes is completely skewed. “Do you see that vortex, there, at the crib?” Says Conny van Bekkum (41), skipper at the rescue brigade.
The rescue brigade normally does not supervise the Waal, but regularly practices with the lifeboat, such as today. For Van Bekkum it has been a while since she was driving the lifeboat, so now she can practice turning and installing again. In two months, during the free festival Appelpop, volunteers from the Rescue Brigades in Tiel and Oss will guard the River around the Veerpont. “For example, we shout that people should not be on the railing of the ferry,” says board member Helian Loijer. She is wearing a waterproof floating suit for the exercise.
The Waal is treacherous in some places. Photo Bram Petraeus
The ferry that brings cyclists and pedestrians from Tiel to the other side of the river sometimes skewed completely through the strong current. Photo Bram Petraeus
Photos Bram Petraeus
Van Bekkum sails the lifeboat to the other side of the Waal, where a long breakdown has been laid to give the river more space at high tide. The river flows like a whitewater course between the stone dam and the Wal.
Due to the low water, people go further into the river, closer to the navigation channel, the current is stronger
“Nice beach, isn’t it?” Says Loijer. “It’s great to lie here. But if you go into the water here, you don’t immediately see how strong the flow is at the breakwater. The river is very treacherous.” That the water in the Waal is currently very low does not help, she thinks. “As a result, people go further into the river, closer to the navigation channel, the current is stronger.”
And then there are the cargo ships that regularly pass by. “A large ship first pulls the water towards itself, then high waves form,” says Schipper van Bekkum.
Anyone who sees a drowning person in the Waal should not go after it, says Conny van Bekkum of the Rescue Brigade.
Photo Bram Petraeus
The Tiel Rescue Brigade has around sixty members. New growth comes mainly from the swimming lessons for the ABC diploma: after obtaining a diploma, children receive a flyer. At the rescue brigade they can continue to save swimming lessons. If they are old enough, they can also follow the training for lifesaver and water aid worker. Then they can go on the boat. Loijer: “Every now and then, parents will send their child to us after the A diploma to get them more swimming. Compared to swimming lessons, we are cheaper because we work with volunteers.”
Risk of drowning
For children who were not born in the Netherlands, the risk of drowning is many times higher, CBS figures from the past ten years show. For children up to ten years old born outside of Europe, the risk of drowning is eleven times greater, among ten to twenty-year-olds the risk is even sixteen times as great. Of all age cohorts, people over 60 are the largest group that dies due to drowning. That happens most often in open water, after a fall.
Anyone who sees a drowning person in the Waal should not go after it: even for people with a rescuer diploma in their pocket, that is unwise, says Conny van Bekkum. “You better try to get someone with a rope aside. If you jump in yourself, you also endanger your own life.”
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