Father dies of suspected heart attack on Gold Coast beach

It’s the news story no-one likes to hear let alone report but yesterday, we were informed of the tragic news that a family holidaying from Victoria lost their father to a suspected heart attack in the waters of the Broadbeach coastline.

The man was swimming with his thirteen year old son in relatively shallow water, between the flags when he started to turn purple. The amazing lifeguards patrolling the area wasted no time in pulling him out of the water and attempting to revive him for over 20 minutes with CPR and a defibrillator.

Being school holidays, the beach was extremely busy and many by-standers played witness to the sad series of events as the attempts to revive the man were unsuccessful as his wife and son watched on.

The Lifeguard weekend supervisor commented to the Gold Coast Bulletin on the lifeguards actions confirming that there was nothing further that could have been done to change the outcome. “The defibrillator said no action was required which is never a good sign,” said lifeguard Tony Lunney.

Our thoughts go out to the family and our gratitude goes to those on the beach who tried to save him.