A California surfer died last month after contracting an aggressive staph infection, a disease he might have gotten after ignoring warnings to stay out of the waves due to dangerously high bacteria levels.
Barry Ault, 71, went surfing along Sunset Cliffs shortly before Christmas despite warnings to avoid it for three days because of runoff from a recent rainstorm in San Diego, his wife, Sally Ault, told ABC's San Diego affiliate KGTV. Three days later, he landed up in a coma after developing flu-like symptoms.
The well-known community surfer, known as "the essential water man," died on Christmas Day, she told ABC10, hoping to make other swimmers aware of the very real warnings often issued to surfers after rainstorms.
"He had a raging staph infection, so he was in complete sepsis," Sally Ault told KGTV. "His whole body was full of staph."
Staph infections can usually be treated with antibiotics. But since the 71-year-old had been given a replaced heart valve in February, the condition made it difficult for the antibiotics to treat the infection, Dr. Eric McDonald of San Diego county's Health and Human Services Agency said.
Two other friends who surfed with him on the last day were also reported to have fallen seriously sick, with one of them being required to inform the Centers for Disease Control. But they didn't experience the same consequences as Ault, the New York Daily News reported.
Although Ault's wife doesn't believe the bacteria-tainted water killed her husband since there's no legitimate proof, she claims "it's too big of a coincidence."
"But there's runoff everywhere, so I would just hope that anybody who, after a rain, would just wait, even when the surf is good," she said. "There's going to be another good day."
Ault, who served as a lieutenant in the Navy and won several surfing competitions including the U.S. Surfing Championship in Huntington Beach in the Master's category in 1970 and first place in the senior category in Hawaii in 1980 according to an online obituary, will be celebrated in a public paddle out on Jan. 17. His family plans to spread his ashes across the sea.
