1,000 lifeguards are being recruited to safeguard beaches on Spain’s Costa Blanca

The Valencian government is gearing up for the return of holidaymakers and has launched a recruitment drive to hire 1,000 lifeguards to patrol Costa Blanca beaches.

WITHIN 24 hours of announcing the vacancies yesterday, the platform of the regional employment service, Labora, had received more than 5,000 applications.

The essential security measure will cost approximately €6.3 million in salaries for two and a half months – from June 24 to September 7, as well as training at the Valencian Institute of Public Security (Ivaspe).

Of the thousand lifeguards, 418 will be concentrated on the beaches in Alicante Province, 348 in Valencia and 234 in Castellón.

The distribution between coastal municipalities is based on several criteria.

These include the size of the beach, the density of visitors and whether they are urban beaches or not.

Lifeguards’ duties will differ this year due to the coronavirus pandemic.

As well as public safety, they will be responsible for enforcing the rules and regulations, specifically, “ensuring compliance with the measures of social distance both in the dry zone and in accesses by users,” said the regional government in a statement.

They will also control access and capacity of beaches, working with town halls and contact 112 emergency services if “any emergency or incident arises.”