Dangers lurk everywhere in life. And now more than ever people are suing like crazy to collect on accidents that maybe could have been avoided. Sometimes things just happen and you can’t get out of their way. Other times you might believe that if someone else had been doing their job, you or a loved one wouldn’t get hurt. With lawsuits on the rise, cities with beaches have had to draw their lines in the sand to keep beaches open and as safe as they can be by putting up signs. Hotels are being asked to put up signs around pools and other areas in not one language, but many, and municipalities are spending larger sums of their budgets to litigate in lawsuits against them. There are no clear cut answers, but in the hope of keeping swimming pools around, beaches open, firepits for beach bonfires available, and life more than just a nanny state, people have to stop and think straight. If it’s dangerous or could be so, don’t go! Don’t dive in, drive, swim or go near fire. Be cautious and safe!

Should adults be held responsible for their own actions in hotels and resorts owned by California companies?

A federal judge ruled that a Newbury Park company, Pleasant Travel Service, must stand trial after a hotel guest, Song Meyong Hee, suffered hypoxia at Royal Lahaina Resort swimming pool that the company owns in Maui. The family sued the hotel, its owners and operator for not having a lifeguard on duty, even though signs warned that there was no lifeguard.

Song would most likely have avoided the brain damage from which she now suffers if they had been more signs that adequately warned of the risks and if a lifeguard had been present, the family claims. U.S. District Judge Leslie Kobayashi refused to dismiss negligence claims against Pleasant Travel Service.

Lawsuits on the books and waiting for trial or settlements involving California:

• A couple sues the City of Huntington Beach after their child gets burned in a beach firepit.
• Pro volleyball Olivia Waldowski filed a lawsuit against Huntington Beach after getting injured while competing during an event in the city in which she landed on a piece of lumber buried in the sand after diving for a ball. She sustained bruises on her legs and lacerations that required several stitches and wanted at least $25,000 for her injuries.
• In August a group sued the City of San Francisco for up to $30 million over its emergency rock walls at Ocean Beach.
• A Laguna Beach city employee is suing Laguna Beach for her electrical bicycle crash, claiming the city failed to properly maintain a street, not removing root deformity which her bike ended up hitting.
• The wife of a Hawthorne motorcycle police officer killed in a collision with another police officer while on duty filed a $25 million lawsuit against the cities of El Segundo and Manhattan Beach.
• Hollister clothing threatened to sue Hollister, California over t-shirts the city sold with their town’s name on them. Hollister the brand was launched in 2000. Hollister the town was incorporated in 1872. Abercrombie & Fitch says it pulled the name Hollister out of thin air, and used it to build up a fictional California beach town to help sell its line of surf apparel.
• A couple sues the City of Huntington Beach after their daughter was killed in the Junior Lifeguard program. A city-owned boat ran over the swimmer during practice drills.
• The family of a Huntington Beach man who died in a boating crash riding a 12-foot, inflatable Zodiac boat during high tide at 1 a.m. filed a lawsuit against the city for the the bridge I beam not being properly illuminated, according to the suit.

No lawsuit...

• Police and firemen in Alameda watched a man drown but couldn’t rescue him because they didn’t have proper certifications for water rescue, leaving them open to possible lawsuits if they attempted to save him. The drowning victim was reportedly suicidal, wading 150 yards into cold waters off Crown Beach in Alameda and taking about an hour to drown himself.