Lifeguard Sees Swimmers In Trouble 6 Blocks Away, 4 Rescued In Seaside

SEASIDE PARK, NJ ? Four people were rescued from a rip current in Seaside Park on Tuesday afternoon thanks to a keen-eyed Seaside Heights lifeguard who spotted the struggling swimmers from his stand six blocks away, an official said.

The rescue happened on the Stockton Avenue beach in Seaside Park, said Hugh "Jay" Boyd, chief of the Seaside Heights Beach Patrol, about 4:30 p.m.

One of the guards, Nick Tomasiello, was on the stand at Hamilton Avenue in Seaside Heights, scanning with binoculars, when he saw the swimmers in distress, Beach Capt. Rob Connor wrote on the beach patrol's Instagram account.

Boyd said Connor, along with Tomasiello and another lifeguard, Mickey Holland, drove down the beach in a 4-wheel-drive vehicle to Stockton Avenue, where a surfer known locally as Kenny Mac was helping the four swimmers with a surfboard.

"The 4 victims were in big trouble," Connor wrote. Kenny Mac owns the Playa Bowls franchise on the boardwalk in Seaside Park, Boyd said.

Boyd said Tomasiello and Holland went into the water to help and Connor used a rescue rope to help bring them back onto the sand.

Boyd said Tri-Boro First Aid responded to treat one person who "had taken in a lot of water," but he could not confirm whether that person was taken to the hospital.

"I had to get my guards back to cover our beach," Boyd said.

The Stockton Avenue beach is the site where authorities had been searching since Sunday for a missing swimmer, after several people got caught in a rip current while swimming after lifeguards had left for the day.

A person's body was recovered from the surf in Seaside Park on Wednesday morning but authorities have not yet said whether it is that of the missing swimmer.

Seaside Heights will have lifeguards on the beach daily through Sunday, then weekends through the rest of September.