the boy who died in Tommy Lee's pool was the son of the german actress Ursula Karven, he's name was Daniel. He was 4 years old.

I grew up in a house with a pool. I was 5 when my parents had the pool installed. They had a fence put around the pool to separate it from our jungle gym in the backyard. My sister, who was a baby when we got the pool, always had to wear her lifevest when she went outside. We were educated from an early age on pool safety and not getting into the pool without adult supervision.

Now that I have kids of my own, I have highly educated them on pool safety. We have a pool in our backyard. We do not have a fence around it, but we have 2 very heavy, hard to open doors that lead to the outside. Our pool is surrounded by a paved deck. Our daughters (ages 6 and 4), have been warned of the dangers of walking on the deck without their swimsuits on and a parnet out there with them. They have both received swim lessons. I understand that accidents do happen, but we have done what we can to fully educate them on pool safety.

I believe Tracey Gold's oldest son nearly drowned a few years ago as well. Pools scare me and I worked at a pool store for seven years. People can never be too careful with a pool and some people who own a pool are not as carfeul as they should be. I am so sorry to hear about their loss. Thank you for this educative post.

We have an inground pool. Our two youngest children are 18 months and 4 1/2 yrs. In addition to safety fencing around the pool, we also have a pool alarm that senses any disturbances in the water (a splash, etc) and sets off an alarm inside of the house. Despite all of the measures that we have taken to protect them, it still terrifies me to have a pool with such young children in the home.

I have a friend who lost his two-year-old daughter to drowning in their neighbor's pool. My cousin also lost his two-year-old son to drowing in their family pool. It was devastating. Soon after my daughter was born, my parents put in a pool behind their house. I made certan that they installed a good fence, to help prevent any more tragedies.

Although I don't have kids now, I realize and learned that educating kids of any age about pool safety is really important, as well as making sure there is an adult supervising them at ALL times, after hearing about a tragic accident that had happened three years ago to one of my dad's coworker's 23 month old daughter (who was a few weeks short of her second birthday). The toddler's uncle took her and her three older brothers to a park with a public pool, along with his own kids. Everything was going fine, the uncle was watching all the kids, who were near the pool with careful supervision, especially on the little girl since she was very young. For some reason, the uncle had to get something from a bag, so he took his eyes away for only 30 seconds and when he suddenly turned around, he had found the little girl in the pool floating face down. He freaked out. He and a lifeguard tried to revive her. At first it seemed to be successful as the girl opened her eyes, but then she closed them again. They kept on trying to revive her over and over again until the ambulance came, but couldn't do much. She was pronounced dead at the hospital. It was really traumatizing for the entire community, and obviously sad. I remember for the next couple weeks after the little girl's death the newspapers always provided information and advice about dealing with young kids and swimming pools. It was learned from this tragedy that small mistakes can be deadly.

We installed a babyguard pool fence around our pool when my daughter was 7 months old. I refuse to allow the fence to give me a false sense of security, that is one mistake some parents make. Toddlers and children are resourceful so I just have to keep an eye on her. Our patio door does have an alarm so if it is open, it chimes and we are also looking into an alarm for the pool like Tracy mentioned. This year will be more of a challenge since my daughter will be spending more time in the pool.

I cannot imagine the pain that the family is going through. I don't have any children, but do have two nieces, one of whom is joining us on a family holiday this year. The house we have rented has a pool and it is a niggle to us all of what tragedies can occur.

My niece [3 next month] is so excited about going swimming and having me teach her under-water handstands and such. I am a strong swimmer, but it still worries me. Luckily, there are over 10 of us going on this holiday, so there will be plenty of people watching over her. Plus, we specially chose this house because it had a fence around the pool to help keep her away.

Thank you for the points, I'll be sure to keep them in mind when planning and preparing for the vacation.

Ursula Karven is not only a famous actress, she also has a successful company called bellybutton together with Dana Schweiger, the ex-wife of Till Schweiger, and a few other moms. Bellybutton has several items for moms to be, moms and babies.

During the summer, I work as a camp counselor at a camp for children with chronic and terminal illnesses. Swimming is part of every day life at camp, and we have children from age 7 to 16 with varying degrees of illness. We have very good counselor to camper ratios at camp (1 to every 3 kids). So when we go into the Pool House, the children are instructed to select a buddy counselor. Every ten to fifteen minutes while swimming, the lifeguards on duty call Buddy Check and you have 15 seconds to get to the side of the pool with your buddies. It is a good way to keep tabs on all the kids and make sure that everyone is staying close with their buddy.

My parents have a pool- the cover is ALWAYS on and locked unless someone is actively using the pool. Also, the grandkids are not allowed to swim unless their parents are there to supervise. So if my mom is babysitting fo rme- my kids don't swim until I come back.
I used to be a lifeguard- I was appalled at the number of parents who do not watch their children because they felt the 'lifeguard would be enough' supervision. I can't tell you how many times I pulled struggling swimmers from the water only to find their parents were nowhere nearby. Atrocious.

If you have a pool or spa, you also want to invest in an anti-entrapment drain cover. These covers, when properly installed, prevent entrapment incidents where a child is stuck onto the pool or spa's drain. Former Secretary of State James Baker lost his granddaughter to an entrapment incident five years ago. Contact your pool store or maintenance company for info. They are very inexpensive.

PLEASE VISIT:

www.childdrowningprevention.com

Ya know they always say it just takes a second for a child to fall in and for your life to change. I say it takes way more then a second, for a child to wander out to a pool, fall in then drown means that child is unsupervised for some time not a second. I am not condemning anyone who has gone through this yet I have pulled 2 toddlers out of pools at two different times. We were all close to the pool and yes it took a second, for each child to fall in and for me to grab them as well as others who tried to help. But for a child to wonder outside then fall in then drown means that child is unsupervised for far too long. Like I said no one deserves this, but children need to be watched at all times and the parents need to know where they are at all times when a pool is involved. Don't depend on a fence, lock or a pool alarm, be accountable for the safety of your kids. It is such an avoidable tragedy and I think so many parents have become so complacent. Everyone has child locks and child proofing which is wonderful I have it too but those measures to do take the place of proper supervision.
Ok I will get off my soap box now :)

I cannot believe that it is not mandatory in America to have a fence. In Australia, if you own a pool you MUST LEGALLY have a 5ft fence surrounding the pool with all access points to have childproof locks.
With Spas they must be covered at all times when not in use. This is just common sense when it comes to safety!!!
This point baffles me, as we have all seen the way children act around water, some are scared and some think they can just dive right in!
Even with training your child I still cannot believe parents would trust them around such an open space of water, Really throughout winter etc. you dont re-inforce as much as you should so the child will forget.
If you want to own a pool a fence should be an automatic extra!!!

In Australia I'm pretty sure it's illegal to have a pool that isn't fenced off seperately from the rest of the yard. We also have great pool/water safety adverts running on TV. There's on that has a silly little jingle but my little brothers actually sing along:

"Fence the pool. Close the gate. Teach your kids to swim it's great. Supervise. Watch your mate. And learn how to resuscitate."

Most Australian kids have swimming lessons both outside and at school because there's almost always a water source around, whether it's a pool, river, lake, dam or ocean.

In my area, you must have a fenced in yard if you have a pool. You do not have to have a fence around the pool though. A child who's family I am very close to fell into his family's pool at his home. He snuck out a door that his parents didn't know he could unlock and fell into their 18inch high inflatable pool. It is not just big pools that are risks. PLEASE get an alarm for your pool!! They do make floating alarms for soft-sided pools.
Maybe a pool alarm could have saved this child from many years of therapy and rehabilitation.
Please make sure that, as a parent or member of any community, you are CPR certified! A few hours of instruction could very well save a life.

i have another tip that you haven't got on there: always always always check to make sure the pool gate is latching properly. do it regularly.
i have a friend who has a nearly 2 year old daughter. they have a well fenced pool in their back yard. in the winter of 2006 we had a fairly big snowfall and unbeknownst to my friend the weight of the snow on the gate had pushed it out of alignment just enough that it didn't latch properly. it seemed to latch fine but it wasn't. the baby was 11 months old and my friend was hanging out her laundry and baby leaned on the gate and it opened. my frined found her face down in the pool. thank god she was ok but it was a very near miss. since then they check the latch every single day.
don't ever take for granted that the gate is working properly. always check. i can not stress that enough.

This is exactly why we are having our pool removed in a few weeks....I have a very busy 2-year old and am expecting another baby in June, and at this point would rather have a backyard with a nice swing set and slide than a pool.

I am what you would call a safety freak, as a mom to a 17 month old and 2 year old I feel its my job to anticipate the unthinkable. A few years ago, my cousin was inside the house nursing her son, and her first son was playing inside when he noticed (this was a rental house as they were building a new one) there was a toy next to the pool. Well he went outside to get it fell and was knocked out and fell into the pool. He nearly drowned and was life flighted to the children's hospital. The next day the landlord fenced in the pool (something he'd been promising to do) and they bought a pool alarm for extra measure. Its not just pools, I also have a cousin who died when her dad backed over her with his company's van she was just 2 years old. Back up cameras should be standard just like seatbelts.

Lisa P, I agree that fences should be required for all pools. In the united states though we sometimes pass laws or requirements that only are for a city, county, or state. I hope that one day the us passes a law that requires all pools to have a fence. When we get a pool that is the first thing we will put up.

I am 41 and have been around water my entire life. Many many pools, and I grew up on a lake. I started water skiing when I was only 6. I have seen some horrible things that were so simply preventable. Starting when I myself was only 8 years old, I pulled a 2 yr. old from the water w/ her mother only about 5 feet away sitting on the edge of the pool talking w/ a fellow country club member. I was a very sensitive child and it really shook me up. But undoubltedly the most horrible water incident I have witnessed happened when I was about 11-12. My family was on the lake w/ our houseboat docked in it's slip. We were facing the dam at Norris Lake here in Tennessee. 2 men who were out motorcycle rinding stopped at a "beach" area directly across from us where you could walk down into the water. They undressed down to their bluejeans and walked into the water and 1 man dropped down and never came up alive. The other man screamed for help and many people from their docks got in their boats and raced over, of course my father whom I've witnessed assist in several accidents throughout my life was one of the first over and he grabbed our ski rope and went down into the murky water and w/in a few dives was able to locate the man, wrap the rope around his body and bring him to the surface. I remember very clearly to this day seeing that blue-tinted lifeless body being pulled up. It was so horrible and my poor dad had many nightmares about it and actually dove off his bed while dreaming about it and broke his nose. We were told that this man could not swim and they were just going to go in far enough to get cooled off, but as many of you know, there are drop offs in lakes. I still love the water today and raised 2 adult children around water and my 9 year old loves it as much as I always have. I can honestly say that my children were never and my daughter will never be near water w/ out me supervising. It has never even been questioned by my kids. Also, I am CPR and first aid certified and am careful to keep my certifications up to date.

Parents - there is another resource to save our children from drownings, its called Infant Swimming Resource. Please visit this website and find an instructor near you. It is worth every minute and penny spent. www.infantswim.com.