
Surf Patrol shows the work of volunteer life-savers in the 1950s, patrolling Australia's dangerous surf beaches.
Australia's beaches, ringed as they are by dangerous surf, call for vigilance by even the best swimmers. The film stresses that these men and women, who devote their energies to this, give up much of their leisure to equip themselves for the task. As well as being expert swimmers and qualifying for swimming awards, they spend as many as two or three evenings a week studying life-saving methods and human physiology. How they man life-boats which fight huge seas, how with belt and line they brave heavy seas to rescue the unfortunate and unwary, and how they apply the most efficient methods of resuscitation to the apparently drowned, makes a highly exciting and interesting film.
The National Film and Sound Archive of Australia acknowledges Australia’s Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples as the Traditional Custodians of the land on which we work and live and gives respect to their Elders both past and present.