Why do police officers drive trucks on the beach? SC woman's death brings calls for change. (2024)

MYRTLE BEACH — Brian Stanford felt for the beach patrol officer.

After anHorry County officer drove a truck over a 66-year-old woman on June 13, Stanford and a group of other beachgoers lifted the front bumper of the Ford Ranger to slide out the crushed woman.

The officer was distraught. The woman later died.

Stanford doesn’t believe there was any ill intent, though he keeps thinking the officer shouldn’t have been in that situation in the first place.

“I don’t think the trucks should be on the beach,” he said. “ATVs, like they use on other beaches, are sufficient enough.”

The death of Myrtle Beach's Sandy Schultz-Peters has sparked questions about why local police and rescue agencies drive full-size vehicles on the beach during the busy summer tourist season. Some lawmakers have even called for limiting the use of beach trucks during peak times. They argue the coast is too crowded for officers to safely navigate through sunbathers.

“Down on the beach, you would need a vehicle that’s low profile so you could see someone laying on a blanket or a towel,” state Rep. William Bailey, R-Little River, said. “It just doesn’t make sense. These vehicles are too large for a compact area. And 99.9 percent of the time they’re doing basic patrol.”

Bailey has already begun drafting a bill that, if approved, would prohibit agencies from driving full-size vehicles on the beach during the busiest times of day unless they are responding to an emergency.

A former North Myrtle Beach public safety director, Bailey said when he was managing the city’s beach patrol he tried to minimize the hours trucks would be on the beach, and officers often utilized ATVs because the smaller vehicles were safer.

A North Myrtle Beach Police spokesman did not respond to a request for comment about the agency’s current practices.

Bailey emphasized that police departments prefer to use trucks because they can carry more equipment and allow officers to work in the comfort of air conditioning. But he contends the “convenience factor” isn’t worth the risk.

He pointed out that last year lawmakers banned a vehicle modification that raises a front fender more than 4 inches above the back one. The “Carolina squat” legislation came in response to police concerns about driver visibility in tilted trucks. The “Carolina squat” was even blamed for a fatal wreck in Myrtle Beach.

If state lawmakers can justify banning squatted trucks, Bailey argues they shouldn’t have a problem limiting the use of full-size public safety vehicles on the beach.

“This is a big deal,” he said. “For somebody to say, ‘Oh, accidents happen,’ I get it. But some of the accidents could be prevented.”

Other state lawmakers have expressed interest in Bailey’s proposal.

“What happened was tragic,” said Rep. Tim McGinnis, R-Carolina Forest. “It should never happen. And if that’s a conversation we need to have, then we need to have it.”

Rep. Dennis Moss, R-Gaffney, was on vacation with his family at Myrtle Beach State Park on the day of the fatal beach incident. The park lies just south of the beach access where Schultz-Peters died.

The crash happened just after 1 p.m. State troopers and witnesses say officer Julian "Duke" Brown, who had worked for the county since 1988, drove over Schultz-Peters. She had been sitting on the beach. Authorities have not said what caused the incident, which remains under investigation.

A retired S.C. Highway Patrol sergeant, Moss agrees with Bailey that the larger vehicles are unsafe when the beach is crowded. For routine patrols, he doesn’t see why ATVs wouldn’t suffice. But apart from a legislative fix, he said the recent case should be highlighted in training for beach patrol officers.

“It’s indefensible, inexcusable and it definitely shouldn’t have happened,” he said. “And we want to make sure it don’t happen again.”

Public safety agencies resistant to change

Despite the concerns raised by lawmakers, some local public safety agencies insist they need the larger vehicles.

Myrtle Beach spokeswoman Meredith Denari said both the city’s beach patrol (police department) and ocean rescue (fire department) use compact trucks on the beach, specifically Chevrolet Colorados, Ford Rangers and Nissan Frontiers.

The beach patrol enforces the law while the rescue crews respond to medical calls. They drive the trucks during the busiest times of day, and beach patrol officers sometimes drive larger F-150s at night.

“Beach pick-up trucks are an important and lifesaving asset to beach public safety crews,” Denari said in an email.

Critical equipment such as flotation devices, spine boards, medical aid kits, masks and snorkels take up space, and Denari said that requires a larger vehicle.

She also noted that trucks allow crews to transport people quickly if they need emergency care. It’s not unusual for beach teams to respond to drownings, cardiac arrest patients and those suffering from heat exhaustion.

Myrtle Beach's long, narrow coastline means getting through crowds can be difficult, Denari said. During emergencies, she said officers driving the trucks can quickly exit the sand at a beach access, then shoot down the street to get to a scene near another access. The trucks also provide protection from the sun and rain.

Denari did note that since Schultz-Peters' death the city is “evaluating options for safety equipment additions” for the beach trucks, such as exterior cameras and object detection sensors.

At the same time, she said all departments using trucks on beaches already take precautions. For example, drivers undergo specific training, and the person riding in the passenger seat serves as a “spotter.” Drivers are not allowed to travel faster than 5 mph on the beach, and they may only make left turns.

The Horry County Police Department, where Brown worked, said it would not comment beyond its initial statement.

A Highway Patrol spokeswoman said Duke was alone in the vehicle. It is not known if Horry County requires spotters in its trucks as the city does.

Nationally, there’s a long history of public safety agencies using beach vehicles.

The United States Lifesaving Association, a national organization of beach lifeguards and open water rescuers, noted that beach vehicles have been a part of lifeguard agencies since the 1920s.

B. ChrisBrewster, chair of the USLA’s National Certification Committee, said that while driving the vehicles in sand comes with a “degree of risk,” so does a wide variety of tools lifesavers regularly use, such as rescue boats, ATVs and surfboards.

Choosing one tool over another ultimately comes down to what is most appropriate for a beach, Brewster said.

"(Trucks on beaches) are neither new nor innovative tools at this point, but a standard in lifesaving,” Brewster said.

Other beaches have already moved away from trucks

Midway Fire Rescue in Georgetown County made the switch to a beach ATV in the mid-2000s, and the transition has worked well, Chief Brent McClellan said. First responders can now wind through large crowds and quickly get to those who need help. They're also ideal for the community's narrow beach accesses.

“It’s smaller, it’s easier to navigate, it’s more versatile,” McClellan said. “Our big thing with our ATV is it also has a stretcher on it so that we can transport a patient if we have to respond and grab a patient from the beach. You can’t really do that in a full-size truck.”

The Horry County Police Department,which ran over another beachgoer in 2020, could be making some changes of its own, County Council Chairman Johnny Gardner said.

“I haven’t heard all the arguments pro and con,” he said. “Obviously, safety would be the No. 1 concern. If these big full-size vehicles… are obscuring or limiting or blocking visibility, then we need to look and let’s fix that.”

Although the Highway Patrol is investigating the June 13 accident, the HCPD has also been going through an internal review of the incident. Gardner said it’s too early to say what the council will do, but he expects county leaders to discuss the beach truck issue soon, possibly as early as next month.

“We’re not going to rush out there and do something without thinking it through,” he said. “Unfortunately, a lot of jurisdictions, not Horry County, but a lot of other ones nationwide, will have a horrible incident happen and will go out and try to do something and it ends up backfiring.”

Regardless of whether it's an agency change or statewide legislation, Stanford said the trucks should be replaced. His wife, Cindy, is a nurse, and she briefly cared for Schultz-Peters as they waited for an ambulance to arrive on June 13.

In the aftermath, the couple hurt for the families of the two people involved.

“It was a tragic accident,” Cindy Stanford said. “It could have happened to anybody and anytime.”

But her husband hopes local officials learned a lesson — and make changes.

"Tragic or not," he said, "you hope that, hey, there’s something good and positive that comes out of it.”