Emilia Jenkins says: Okay, so first of then, who is Rico Marshall, when did he join the Lifeguards?

Rico Marshall says: Alright so I joined July 2018, so I'm coming up to my fourth year soon. I joined Lifeguards when it was a fairly small team and ran by one of the old Chiefs Arianna Iglesias.

Rico Marshall says: Back then we had I'd say... potentially seven or so members? It was a pretty small team give the division was still finding its feet and members would come and go. After finishing my probation period I aligned myself up to become a dive -

Rico Marshall says: Instructor since I enjoyed that sub section a lot and this enabled me to have more of an input on actual ocean rescues as well.

Rico Marshall says: Then the role of senior lifeguard got brought into the team to enable that extra level of supervisory that would help people gain the experience needed for Captaincy and onwards. So I became a Senior Lifeguard and then went from there to Captain -

Rico Marshall says: And then section chief.

* Emilia Jenkins flips the page over, she scribbles away, peering up to Rico after he's finished.

Emilia Jenkins says: What's your main duties as Section Chief, what exactly do you do on a day to day basis?

Rico Marshall says: Yes currently there's only one Section Chief. So my primary duty is the day to day running of operations within Vespucci as a whole. So I oversee deployment of units, work closely with other divisions within the Fire Department and I'm the primary -

Rico Marshall says: Incident command within Lifeguards for Ocean rescues with our fellow colleagues in USAR. So we run incidents together if we are both deployed.

Rico Marshall says: I also look after both the Dive team which includes running trainings, equipment checks etc, and also the Baywatch team which is essentially boat rescues. So if a vessel is in distress or a large accident happens for instance -

Rico Marshall says: Lifeguards are trained in how to handle those situations, and can therefore decrease the risk of the incident escalating further.

Rico Marshall says: Anyway in terms of command we often tend to split it into zones. So usually there's around three to four captains, each captain looks after an area. So we have in Vespucci, Zone A, B and C.

Rico Marshall says: One captain primary focus is looking after Zone A, so they ensure patrols are happening, that the area is covered etc. Second Captain looks after Zone B and so on.

Rico Marshall says: You then have the Section Chief watching over all those areas to ensure work is being done.

Rico Marshall says: A lot of my day to day focus recently has been working with external groups to help provide them support with events and build up a better relationship, enabling us to showcase what Lifeguards actually do.

Emilia Jenkins says: Got it, so basically you're a Battalion Chief in a way? You look over the Captains, make sure they're doing their jobs.

Rico Marshall says: Yeah so, in terms of 'equal' rank with the rest of the Department I'm equal to a Fire Captain two, however within Lifeguards I am more in a Battalion Chief position. We currently don't have any Captains so I'm taking their position as well.

Rico Marshall says: When we do have a Captain, they will most likely be focusing on the area towards Tower two and be given the responsibilities of building up another sub section to cover our duties whilst I continue to oversee the rest.

Rico Marshall says: We have around 23 members now so stuff is incredibly busy.

Emilia Jenkins says: Do you handle all the beaches across Los Santos County, or the entire state?

Rico Marshall says: Alright so, our primary focus is Vespucci beach, however we can get dispatched to any calls in the entire state in regards to Ocean rescues or events. So say for instance there is a festival at Paleto beach, we can be requested to patrol there -

Rico Marshall says: Instead. Or if there's a lot of activity in Chumash we can send units there to ensure folks stay safe and get that support.

Rico Marshall says: For day to day running's however, we are for now primarily in Vespucci.

Emilia Jenkins says: Got it, and Tower One, this is essentially your main station, well not station but main HQ for Lifeguards, Tower Two is for Training only, right?

Rico Marshall says: That's correct so Tower one is the main Headquarters for Lifeguards where most people go on shift, host meetings and we even do interviews here now.

Rico Marshall says: Tower two is primarily a training building where we host classes and trainings such as EMT-B potentially, teaching certain dive techniques and we also use the pool for our tryouts.

Rico Marshall says: Moving forward in the near feature we will also be doing a Hydrotherapy sub section that enables Lifeguards to be trained to help do physio in the water in hopes that it will enable anyone in the Department to get help during -

Rico Marshall says: Recovery after a work related incident, and therefore bring them back to full strength quicker.

Rico Marshall says: We also use the top part of Tower two for marine wildlife as we have several incubators for the turtle eggs we may come across that require to be incubated. This is mainly if a nest is found in an unsafe area.

Emilia Jenkins says: Got it, and two final questions for you, any interesting calls the Lifeguards have handled in the past week, anything of note?

Emilia Jenkins says: And lastly, recruitment plans, any plans to open up recruitment soon? If yes, any words of encouragement for prospecting Lifeguards?

Rico Marshall says: We recently got called to a large tugboat accident that had crashed into some rocks and had sent a distress signal out. We eventually located the injured owner on a dinghy, due to the nature of the incident we had to have both Rangers and SFM -

Rico Marshall says: Involvement as well so it was a large team operation which had a successful result at the end of it. You never quite know how rescues are going to go so we are always grateful when we get a successful ending.

Rico Marshall says: In terms of Recruitment we are hoping to open applications middle of June, and I highly recommend for those thinking of applying to go for it. Being apart of the team means yuo are part of something bigger -

Rico Marshall says: And can help make a difference within the community. A lot of our work isn't just doing medical calls and ocean rescues. We take a big interest in the community and help run events. So every single day is different.