The local celebration will be held at the north side of Homer’s small boat harbor, next to the U.S. Coast Guard Roanoke Island building.
“This is a national day dedicated to the education of boating safety for children, youth and parents,” said Sandy Mazen, public education officer for the U.S. Coast Guard Auxiliary’s Homer flotilla.
The auxiliary is one of several organizations sponsoring Saturday’s event. Also involved are Homer SAFE Kids Coalition, Homer Volunteer Fire Department’s Kids Don’t Float program, the Homer Harbormaster Office, Homer Yacht Club and the U.S. Coast Guard.
“There will be PFD (personal flotation device, or life jacket) relays helping convince kids that it’s best to have one on when boating,” said Fire Chief Bob Painter. He added there isn’t always time to don a jacket if you wait until an event occurs, such as a collision, capsizing or an individual being thrown from a boat.
Forty-five PFDs in infant, child and youth sizes will be available as prizes Saturday, paid for with a $1,000 grant from the National SAFE Kids Coalition. Safety Seal, as well as Coastie, the auxiliary’s remote-control boat, will pay visits.
And Coast Guard personnel from the USCGC Roanoke Island will provide demonstrations in survival gear.
The Kids Don’t Float program currently provides five sites at the Homer small boat harbor, with each site supplying as many as eight PFDs in sizes ranging from infant to small adult available for loan as needed. Additional PFDs can be found at the Harbormaster Office.
“We’re looking at increasing the sites to seven,” Painter said.
National Marina Day is in its fifth year and is produced by the Association of Marina Industries based in Washington, D.C.
McKibben Jackinsky can be reached at mckibben.jackinsky@homernews.com.
We encourage you to add your comments. To prevent spam, comments with links are manually approved during the normal business day. Please be respectful of others with your comments, bear in mind anyone in the community may be reading your comments.
