Picture this—you’re straddling a jet-ski in the channel at Mavericks on the biggest day in over a decade. Out the back, a fearless surfer plummets down the face of a wave at least three times larger than your two-story house. As you struggle to keep your balance, you follow the surfer’s perilous track through the lens of your high-powered, and highly expensive, digital camera. Every fiber in your body is urging you to stow your camera, turn your ski, and head for the hills, but you stand firm, knowing that if you retreat, not only will you miss this once-in-a-lifetime shot, but the rider who’s depending on you to scoop them up should they wipe out, might never resurface.
For professional photographer and leader of the Mavericks Rescue team Frankie Quirarte, this is just another day at the office. For the past twenty-eight years, Quirarte has made it his mission to not only document the thrills and spills of the best riders brave enough to tackle the bone-crushing waves at Mavericks in Half Moon Bay, but to use his well-earned safety skills to perform daring rescues when the unthinkable happens.