Do you wear your PFD (open water)

PFDs
In the West the water is usually cold, so it makes sense to always wear one. I insist that everyone on my trips wear a PFD. I paddled with a guy recently that always had some excuse like, “I changed clothes and forgot to put it back on.” That was on a trip in Feb. I no longer paddle with that guy.

Well, I Don’t Consider It the “Police”

– Last Updated: Jan-29-14 11:47 AM EST –

But, as I said, things happen in calm and easy conditions and those conditions can change in a hurry. Ever seen a phantom gust of wind come out of nowhere and blow a boat 30' in a couple seconds? Ever paddled full out and an unseen underwater reef or boulder stop your boat cold throwing someone overboard or injuring them? How about a nice, gentle current and suddenly, around the bend is a tree completely blocking the water and you're in the water before you can react? These are just a couple illustrations of things that can happen in otherwise benign conditions.

Summer in the Ozarks is no picnic; we regularly get 95-100 degree temps with high humidity. A comfortable PFD with some mesh makes you no more uncomfortable. Take your time, go slower, keep a wet hat on your head and a wet bandanna around your neck to help keep cool.

Wear a PFD, don't wear a PFD, it's a free country. I'm just trying to reach out and make folks think and make an informed decision about being safer.

It is really very simple
If conditions are such that I would have no trepidation whatsoever to jump in the water and swim, I might take off my PFD. I have even (horrors!) gone swimming in lakes and the ocean without a PFD. And it is possible to slip getting into a bathtub, strike your head, and drown, and I don’t wear a PFD while taking a bath either.

Always. I meet a lot of new paddlers
and I have grandkids watching me on the water. One picture is worth…

Yes, always

– Last Updated: Jan-29-14 12:46 PM EST –

I paddle Lake Michigan, and always have on a pfd, even in relatively flat water conditions, since the truest words ever spoken were "better safe than sorry."

Even on smaller lakes, I'll wear it, since God forbid something happened unexpectedly that took me out of the boat in an unconscious state, at least I'd be easier to spot if floating rather than not. Worst case scenario, at least it'd make it easier on the guys sent to fish out the body. No reason to be a pain in the ass, dead or alive.

totally agree

– Last Updated: Jan-29-14 2:55 PM EST –

I have been out paddling "close to shore" on lake Erie and Ontario when out of NO WERE a sudden little isolated storm comes upon me. Suddenly its 40 mph winds were it was calm moments before. One of the stories I just read in "More Deep Trouble" was when a storm that wasn't supposed to come for another 2 hours showed up early. It came so fast upon them they had no time to put there PFD on.

Been paddling were a submerged bolder which wasn't seen flipped a guy, totally calm flat water but he was in the water.Had he been alone and not capable of re-entry it could be bad thing to happen.

YES
yep, Idiot would not.

The decision isn’t hard
No need to make a mountain out of a molehill.

Always wear a pfd and it saved my life
Ended up in the water in a cold Atlantic ocean and unable to re-enter because it had gotten too rough. After nearly exhausting my energy in trying to re-enter multiple times, I was just barely able to stay functional long enough to swim the kayak into shore against an out-going tide (while my buddy was in the same situation out of sight 1/4 mile away.) Without the flotation of the pfds to help conserve some energy, I doubt either of us would have made it to shore. Stupidly, we both had VHFs but had them stashed in drybags in the hatches, which made them impossible to get to. (“If we need them we’ll just raft up and get one out.”) Ever since, my VHF goes on my pfd every trip, even on glassy August days. It’s been years since I capsized unintentionally, but a heart attack could come any time.

He’s right
This is an important point. If you have on your PFD and someone in your party doesn’t - if something happens, all of a sudden it’s your issue…and you are at risk for someone else’s poor decision.

Always
It keeps me warm in spring and fall and, interestingly, keeps me cool in the summer. If you get one with the right cut around the chest it doesn’t interfere at all with paddling. So there’s really no reason not to wear one.

No agony involved

– Last Updated: Jan-30-14 12:33 AM EST –

The only reason it takes longer to write why they sometimes don't wear the PFD is that they need to describe the benign conditions involved. If you wear it always, no matter what, there's nothing else to write. In any case, when you state that such an explanation indicates an agonizing decision-making process, it shows you are missing something.

As just one example, I've paddled for miles without a PFD on a creek that's only one foot deep. I may need to explain to you that walking the creek is as easy as walking on a sidewalk so that you'll have some chance of understanding why not wearing a PFD doesn't put me in grave danger, but that doesn't mean I needed to spend any time analyzing the situation to reach that conclusion for myself. The things other people write about this are just other examples of the same idea.

And for what it's worth, most people who know me have probably never seen me paddle without wearing a PFD.

I wore a life jacket and, much of the
time, a helmet while wading and swimming the 25 miles of the Chattooga Headwaters. As it turned out, I never had a serious fall, but even though the river was very low, there were pools that were over my head.



But in extremely hot weather, and in very benign conditions, I used to leave my life jacket in the boat. Now, in old age, my heart can have fibrillation episodes, so the life jacket stays on.



Decades ago, a competent paddler died on the class 1 Lower,lower Toccoa, probably because he had a seizure condition and wasn’t wearing his life jacket.

Hope you never show up at…
a USCA sponsored race with that attitude!



Jack L

Of course exceptions
Some races and our FreeStyle exhibitions Which are ACA sanctioned do not require PFD wearing.

I don’t know Kay
Go back and read all the responses.

Most of them want a PFD on if you are in a foot of water.

Most who think and decide for themselves will not post here because they know they will get jumped all over by some of the ding bats that post here.

Come down to the Florida Keys, and see for every paddler with a PFD, there are ten that don’t wear them.

When I use the term “ding bats” I am not refeering to the ones who are safety conscience and just answer the OP’s question. I am refering to those that have to belittle those of us that wear one when we deem it necessary, and not every time we step into a canoe or kayak.



Jack L

It’s a Habit!

– Last Updated: Jan-30-14 9:30 AM EST –

The hallmark of a habit is that one (almost) automatically performs the action as an integral part of whatever larger activity is involved. So somebody with the habit of "always" wearing their seatbelt in a car just automatically begins to reach around and grapple for the belt and click it into place. Something just feels wrong if, for some reason, they've neglected to do this. Now we all know and understand (don't we?) that we need not attach our seatbelts while sitting in the driveway or garage washing the inside of the windows or fishing for something in the glove compartment. But if we're driving our vehicles, we wear our seatbelts.

The PFD situation is just the same for those who have developed the habit--the PFD goes on as an near-automatic response to getting ready to launch. It does not need to, nor does it usually, get worn while sitting in the kayak on the grass at home, say, while first testing out the latest backband or seat adjustment--we'll probably put in on later, though. But if we're paddling, on water yet, we wear our PFDs. This is what is meant by developing the PFD habit, the seatbelt habit, the tooth-brushing habit, etc., etc.

I offer this explanation for those who have difficulty understanding what habits are and how they work, and find that they must "decide" these simple things every time the situation presents itself. The safety and health statistics will easily demonstrate that good habits result in better outcomes for those who acquire good habits.

Hope this helps!

And there you have it…
Conditions and health change. Ever been paddling with someone who gets injured (person complained about elbow pain early in paddle - an hour later, they are incapacitated)?



I admit that I seldom paddle in Florida or shallow water, but I have seen people who were rendered unconscious (overheating), suffered injuries (tendonitis, hit by powerboat, and can imagine lots of conditions where not having a pfd increases risk significantly - lightning is virtually non-existent where I live, but there are areas, Florida comes to mind, where it is remarkably common. I’ve been a paddler who went out on a calm day and found that an hour later, it was raining and blowing 25 knots, even though the weather report indicated that conditions would be mild that day.



If you paddle for enough years, you experience these types of things. Yes, the odds go down when conditions are good and the water is warm, but they do not disappear. Most hypothermia issues occur in water between 62-72F because people don’t think they need thermal protection.



I’m not trying to be the “police,” but I do want to raise awareness that there are non-zero increases to risk when basic safety equipment is ignored.



There is nothing I hate hearing about more than deaths resulting from easily avoidable situations (such as the couple who lost their 3 YO son on SF Bay because they seemingly didn’t even consider that he could fall off the sailboat). Fortunately, he wasn’t uncomfortable in the PFD he didn’t want to wear, right?



Do or don’t, that’s fine and your choice. If you paddle with me, you do. If not, I probably won’t say a word, but I will go my own way. Personally, I feel that paddling solo is safer than paddling with someone who exercises what I consider poor judgement.



Rick

Maybe those who have gotten into…
trouble while wearing their PFD need to get into the habit of staying off the water if there is ANY chance of them being in conditions they cannot handle!!! Or are they willing to take the risk that they like those who sometimes don’t wear their PFD’s are willing to take?

The habit of thinking
One-size-fits-all rigid rules do not require any thought. Your blowing up the decision to make an exception for the few times they occur suggests that you are the caterpillar who suddenly cannot walk because he doesn’t “understand” how his legs work.



I actually do have the habit of wearing the PFD, as you would “understand” if you’d comprehended my first post. There are exactly two sentences there describing the times when I choose not to wear the PFD on a given outing.



Since you brought up the example of brushing teeth as a habit, here’s a different example: A driver takes the same route to work every day, requiring the same turn or exit. That turn becomes habit. When he has to go somewhere else requiring a different turn or exit, he robotically takes the work-bound turn instead. Brain is on autopilot.



Habits are OK to break sometimes. Not hard to understand.