From her familiar perch in a lifeguard tower in Riviera Beach, Fla., Lt. Sara Williamson was scanning the water when her eyes darted to the sky.
A man piloting a powered paraglider had lost control of the flying contraption on Friday afternoon, sending him into a precarious spiral about 500 feet above the Atlantic Ocean, according to Lieutenant Williamson, a veteran lifeguard with the Palm Beach County Ocean Rescue unit.
Nearby along the shoreline of Singer Island, a beachgoer began recording the potentially life-threatening misadventure with a phone. The video of the free fall, splash landing and dramatic rescue drew widespread attention online.
Lieutenant Williamson scrambled with her lifeguard partner, John Wendel, by foot, ATV and paddle board to reach the man, who, she said in an interview on Tuesday, was in good condition and had avoided injury.
“I actually was looking right at him when he lost control,” she said, estimating she was a half-mile from the crash site. “As soon as I saw him going down, I started running toward it.”
It was not clear what caused the paraglider, who the authorities said was a 52-year-old man from Pompano Beach, Fla., to lose control of the contraption. Efforts to reach the man were not immediately successful on Tuesday.
Sightings of powered paragliders, which typically include a backpack with a motor and kite, are rare along that stretch of coastline, said Lieutenant Williamson, a lifeguard of 20 years.
In the video of the crash, which was posted on social media by the Riviera Beach Police Department, the propeller noise from the motor suddenly cut out, sending the paraglider into a corkscrew.
“Oh, my gosh,” a woman on the beach said repeatedly as the paraglider plummeted into the water.
The paraglider splashed down about 75 yards offshore, according to Lieutenant Williamson, who said she immediately radioed an emergency dispatcher and her partner. Within minutes, Lieutenant Williamson said, she and her partner were able to reach the crash site, where they encountered a man in a diving mask who had been snorkeling nearby and had helped to disentangle the paraglider from his kite lines. The paraglider was wearing a helmet, according to rescuers, who cut away his kite.
“After such a catastrophic fall, I was very impressed that he was doing as well as he was,” Lieutenant Williamson said. “He could have easily drowned from the entanglement.”
The paraglider lifted off from a park in Jupiter, Fla., the police said, and had traveled about nine miles south before the crash.
During her long career as a lifeguard, Lieutenant Williamson said she had trained for all kinds of emergencies. In several instances, she said, she has helped rescue kite boarders from the ocean, including at least one with a frayed kite line.
“I don’t get stressed or nervous going into this,” she said. “In reality, this was probably a once-in-a-lifetime rescue, but in my line of work they all are like that. It’s just second nature to all of us.”
Neil Vigdor covers breaking news for The Times, with a focus on politics.
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