Children's Safety Zone

Mesa fire crews responded to two separate drowning calls seven minutes apart Saturday afternoon.

Fire officials said both calls involved 3-year-old males who had been under water for an unknown period of time.

The first incident occurred just after 3 p.m. near Elliot and Meridian roads in east Mesa.

Officials said an adult male had started CPR and when paramedics arrived the child was breathing and alert. The boy went to Cardon’s Children’s Hospital.

The second call was made just minutes later and appeared more critical.

Mesa police spokesman Anthony Landato said this incident happened near Baseline and Crismon roads.

Fire officials said the child was “in full arrest” with CPR in progress. That 3-year-old boy was also transported to Cardon’s Children’s Hospital where he was pronounced dead.

GLENDALE, AZ – Authorities say a 6-month old girl has died Tuesday morning after she was left unattended in a bathtub.

The incident happened around 4:30 a.m. at an apartment complex near 59th Avenue and Bethany Home Road.

Glendale police Sgt. Brent Coombs said the baby soiled her diaper, and her parents took her to the bathtub to clean her up.

The parents reportedly left her unattended for a brief moment and returned to find the baby in the water.

Glendale fire officials said the girl was pulled from the tub and appeared blue.

Police officers first arrived on scene and performed CPR on the girl.

They were able to revive her, but her condition worsened either on the way to the hospital or upon arrival.

Coombs said the infant was fighting for her life in the hospital until she passed away a few hours later.

Officers were conducting an investigation at the scene with police tape surrounding the home.

It’s unclear if any charges will be filed.

A Valley father received a call that his 1-year-old son was in the hospital and they weren’t sure if he was going to survive.

It was May 13, 2008 when Eric Myers’ wife went to check on her son who was being watched by a relative.

That relative had a backyard swimming pool, but no fencing around it.

The boy was found floating in the water. He had been in there for four minutes.

Four years later, Myers took part in a news conference hosted by the Mesa Fire Department and Cardon Children’s Medical Center warning parents about the dangers of unsupervised children in homes with pools.

“Go home tonight,” Myers said, “sit on the couch with your kids and actually look at a clock. Watch the hands move and count four minutes. Watch how many times your child takes a breath during that time and imagine those breaths being robbed by water.”

Doctors were able to save Myers’ son, who is now a healthy 5-year-old, he said.

So far this year, seven children have drowned in the Valley.

Caleb Teodorescu slept in his hospital room, surrounded by no fewer than a dozen teddy bears, balloons and a toy truck taller than his 2-year-old self.

“He looks remarkable considering what happened to him,” said Dr. Budi Wiryawan, a pediatric intensivist at Banner Thunderbird Medical Center in Glendale.

On Nov. 25, Caleb had been rushed to the hospital in critical condition, not breathing and without a discernible pulse. He had been considered dead for about half an hour, after apparently riding his scooter into the family pool.

Little more than a week later, doctors feel confident Caleb will be able to return home soon, after making an astounding recovery. “It’s really a miracle,” Wiryawan said.

The day after Thanksgiving, Mihaela Teodorescu, 32, had gone to the bathroom while her four children played in the kitchen. She remembered listening to their chatter and noticing the sounds of her youngest had disappeared.

Returning, she asked her kids, “Where’s Caleb?” Her 6-year-old son reached the back door first. Mom, I think I see something in the pool.

Caleb was eight feet underwater, face down. Her oldest daughter dialed 911 as Mihaela dove in after Caleb.

A neighbor administered CPR, but it wasn’t until Caleb arrived at the hospital 28 minutes later that doctors restored his breathing and heartbeat.

Despite the turnaround, Mihaela could sense that the doctors were being cautious. Recovery from this type of trauma, if at all, could take 6 to 12 months, they told her. He could remain sedated for up to a month.

Over the next several days, gifts and prayers poured in for the Teodorescus from their friends, their church, even their native Romania. Caleb responded positively to diagnostic tests the doctors gave him. To their surprise, his heart, lungs and brain seemed to be doing fine.

He was taken off of his ventilator and began to breathe on his own.

Exactly one week after the accident, Caleb looked up at his father, grabbed his face, and spoke again for the first time since the incident.

“Nose,” he said.

On Saturday, doctors pulled Caleb off of intravenous nutrition. He walked again and even rode a small tricycle through the hospital halls. He spent the rest of the day napping and squirming in his mother’s arms, babbling and smiling as she held him.

Doctors are confident that, by Monday, Caleb will be able to go home, where the Teodorescus are installing a pool cover.

Months after her 4-year-old son’s drowning last July, Brooke Thomas has reviewed every possible detail from the afternoon of July 22.

It had been a happy day, her oldest son’s seventh birthday, spent playing in a neighbor’s pool for nearly three hours. When it came time to leave, Brooke turned to put away her children’s floaties and other things. When she looked back, her younger son, Charles “Maverick,” was nowhere to be seen.

In the frantic moments that she and others searched the house and pool for Maverick, they had somehow missed seeing him at the bottom of the pool, obstructed by shadows from nearby palm trees. A waterfall feature was another distraction. The bottom of the pool was covered with tiles, which had turned the water from clear to something of a deep-colored lagoon by afternoon.

Furthermore, Maverick’s swim trunks — navy blue with a Hawaiian pattern — had helped camouflage him underwater. By the time someone spotted him from the other side of the pool, it was too late.

Since the drowning, Thomas has returned to the pool to take pictures of the water as it shifted colors later in the afternoon. What if Maverick, who had taken some recreational swim classes, had been taught to float on his back or tread water? The incident was nothing like she had seen of fictional drownings on television: Maverick had not flailed or screamed. They believe he must have been reaching for a toy, then silently slipped beneath the water’s surface.

Although Maverick died in the summer, the Thomas family wants to deliver a message: A child can drown any time of the year.

“Any measure we could have taken, we took. And yet it still happened,” Thomas said. “If it can happen to us, it can happen to anybody.”
A year-round hazard

A high risk of drowning exists year-round in Arizona, said Lori Schmidt, president of the Drowning Prevention Coalition of Arizona. But there tend to be different reasons between summer and winter.

“In the summer months, it tends to be a supervision issue,” Schmidt said. Often, parents or other adults are distracted and children are left near the water without “eye-to-eye supervision.”

In the winter months, drownings tend to be the result of barrier issues. The pool may not be protected by a fence or a cover, or existing ones are in disrepair. Children, ever drawn to small spaces, have been known to crawl through doggy doors.

“We’re not really expecting kids in the water,” Schmidt said. “We had no inkling that the child would even be near the water.”

The winter months also are when visitors flock to Arizona, descending upon homes that may not be properly equipped for young children. What Valley residents consider to be sweater weather could be a perfect poolside day for guests.

“People come visiting and think, ‘Oh, it’s so beautiful here.’ They don’t have any problems running around in flip-flops and sundresses,” Schmidt said. “Especially kids. Kids don’t really care if it’s cold or not. They’re getting in the water.”

Pools are not the only source of danger, she added. Hot tubs, canals, bathtubs and just about anything that can hold rainwater around the house should be monitored, fenced or emptied.

“Anything that holds an inch of water can be a water hazard,” she said.
Numbers, prevention

According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention in Atlanta, drownings are the leading cause of injury and death for children ages 1 to 4.

Last year, Maricopa County had 49 drownings. Of those deaths, 16 were of children, and the majority occurred by May.

“We had a horrible spring,” Schmidt said. “We were on pace to double, if not triple, our drowning deaths (in Maricopa County).”

In 2010, there were 48 drownings in Maricopa County; 20 of those were children. Although child drownings decreased, the total number of “water-related incidents,” including near drownings, increased last year to 179 from 140.

“We can prevent drowning,” Schmidt said. “You’ve got to protect your families no matter what time of year.”

Thomas said her devoutly religious family can move on by using their experience to help prevent other families from suffering the same grief. They founded the Maverick Movement, a group that aims to raise awareness about water safety.

“It would be really easy for me to be done with the pool, to be an overbearing mom,” Thomas said.

On the contrary, the rest of her family, including her two other children, returned to the pool within days.

“That was important to us, because we wanted them to see that you can have fun in the water, that it’s good for you and good exercise,” she said. “We wanted them to remember the fun memories of that day.”

The memories include the way Maverick would jump into her arms in the pool and snuggle up to her face until their noses were touching.

“I love you, Mommy,” he would say.

Without missing a beat, she would respond: “I love you, too, Maverick.”