HALEIWA » Dusk masked the approaching waves at Banzai Pipeline on the North Shore of Oahu as they climbed to 15 feet before pounding the shallow, jagged reef below. Adrift in the rapid current and foamy sea was a photographer, exhausted from battling the relentless waves and fighting for his life.

Adam Lerner, a lifeguard on the North Shore, was just finishing a long shift when he made out the shadow of a body being dragged like driftwood over rapids around Pipeline’s surf. With the waves too big for a rescue board, Lerner grabbed a flotation device, waited for a lull in the pounding surf and dived in.

Lerner reached the photographer, taking "a couple waves on the head," he said. They battled a current pulling them out, waves holding them down and a night growing ever darker. With luck they washed ashore, gasping and grateful to be on land.

"I was literally floating in the water in 15- to 18-foot surf, in the middle of the night, with this total stranger," Lerner said.

When they reached the shore, "he went that way and I went that way," Lerner added, chuckling to himself.

So it goes for the North Shore lifeguards of the city Ocean Safety and Lifeguard Services Division, a group of 42 full-time workers given the task of patrolling one of the most dangerous stretches of beach in the world. Called the Seven Mile Miracle, Oahu’s North Shore attracts both pro surfers and amateur swimmers to tangle with the massive swells that roll in frequently during the winter. In 2013 there were more than 1,000 ocean rescues and major medical cases handled by the lifeguards on the North Shore.

The duties of the division are as varied as the surf here, and the patrol has evolved from a few lifeguards wandering the beach with a buoy in the 1960s to a tiered, role-specific system with seven staffed lookout towers, four mobile units and two personal rescue watercraft, or "skis," patrolling the northern coast.

Each guard has a rank and a task on the force, akin to the structure of a fire department. There are those who patrol the beach on all-terrain vehicles, others who man the lookout towers, and those able to navigate the waves and current, making saves with only a buoy or a board. The most experienced guards drive the skis, the 1,000-pound personal watercraft with rescue sleds attached to the sterns.

Despite these modern advances, the job remains one of nearly constant challenge. Lifeguards must battle a force in the ocean far greater than anything that technology can overcome.

"I would guarantee nobody plans to be a lifeguard their whole career," said Mark Dombroski, 60, who, with more than three decades of service, seems to be a contradiction to his own statement.

He said the hours are long, the dangers numerous and the pay less than that of firefighters and police officers. But for some it is a calling.

"Some of those guys who left, they come right back to this job when they figure it all out," Dombroski said.

Nearly all of the guards on staff have spent numerous hours surfing the towering waves on the North Shore. Most were drawn to the job from that hobby, giving them knowledge of the dangers of each break.

At Banzai Pipeline, one of the most famous breaks in the surfing world, the beauty of the waves shrouds their danger. Pro surfers and locals alike have cracked ribs and spines and lost chunks of flesh on the rocks and reef below.

At Waimea Bay large swells can produce wall-like waves far from shore that can hold wiped-out surfers underwater for minutes at a time. Smaller swells produce dangerous shore break and currents that can prove deadly, even for a bystander.

To prevent injury and keep in shape, the lifeguards take a strenuous physical fitness test every year, and again if they are off duty for more than 30 days. They must run up the beach for 1,000 yards and swim the 1,000 yards back in less than 25 minutes. They must also paddle 400 yards on a rescue longboard in less than four minutes. Then they must sprint 100 yards in the soft sand, swim 100 yards back and sprint back again, all in less than three minutes.

Many live by an ethos that began with Eddie Aikau, the first lifeguard hired to patrol the North Shore, in 1968. Equipped with only an orange flotation device and an unmatched knowledge of the shore’s breaks, Aikau helped manage chaos at Wai­mea Bay. Local lore has it that no swimmer ever drowned under Aikau’s watch.

The phrase "Eddie Would Go" — in deference to Aikau’s final act, paddling away alone in the open ocean to find help for the capsized Hoku­le‘a sailing canoe (he was never seen again) — is heeded by many of the lifeguards on the North Shore, including Dombroski, who got his job through Aikau.

"They treated me like a friend or younger brother," Dombroski recalled.

From the days of Aikau to today, the lifeguards and the surfers of the North Shore have been intertwined, even at the sport’s highest level.

"These guys are the best in the world," said Mick Fanning, the 2013 world surfing champion. "Every time you paddle out, you know they got your back."

Jamie O’Brien, a pro surfer who grew up on the North Shore, learned many of his lessons about the ocean from his father, who was a lifeguard here for 23 years.

"Those guys are my hanai family," O’Brien said of the guards, using a Hawaiian term that roughly translates to "adopted." "When I was growing up surfing here at Pipeline, there were no ifs, ands or buts about it. I had to come home and go right in front of where my father was stationed."

John John Florence, who finished third in the 2014 world title race, credited the lifeguards with getting him to where he is today.

"There were probably so many times where I would have been so much more unconfident in paddling out without having the lifeguards there," said Flor­ence, who also spent his childhood surfing the North Shore, from Rocky Point to Pipeline.

SOME HAVE even been rescued themselves. Nathan Fletcher broke his femur at Pipeline in 2009 and was pulled to safety by the guards.

But for all the stories of the major saves, Jesse King, a 28-year-old guard, noted that keeping swimmers out of dangerous areas is as important as the rescues.

"The most successful days are when we don’t get wet," he said.

On a recent day when 25-foot waves were rolling into Wai­mea Bay, a group of tourists walked up the beach, wearing bucket hats and toting pink inflatable tubes and water wings.

Noticing potential novices, a guard in the tower grabbed a bullhorn.

"Just wanted to let anyone arriving at the beach know that we’re not allowing swimming today without fins," the guard said.

The tourists continued their march up the beach, either ignoring the guard or not paying attention. The guard repeated himself. Still nothing.

"Hey, you with the pink floaties," the guard shouted. They stopped and turned around.

"Not today."

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