I’m like that – light bones, long legs and a somewhat ample bosom probably help. My swimming instructor in college was impressed at how long I could tread water during the pool warmups, not realizing that I can actually just float upright with my head above water without moving at all and that my arm and leg movements (that I only did to appear as if I was keeping myself actively afloat) were a sham.
There is one drawback to being so naturally cork-like – when I SCUBA dive I have to use a lot of lead on my waist belt to achieve neutral buoyancy. When I took my PADI course during the winter in a local community pool I wore my 3/4 mm full surfer wet suit (building was danged cold and the pool not exactly toasty). That extra neoprene made things worse and during mandatory exercises, like sitting on the bottom of the deep end and removing all my SCUBA kit and putting it back on, I would start to bob to the surface as soon as my weight belt came off. The gruff instructor was always yelling at me about that – he was built like a fireplug and sank like an anvil in the water so I don’t think he understood what natural buoyancy felt like and how hard it was for me to keep from popping to the surface.
Obviously, there are great advantages. Not least of which is that I don’t panic on immersion since I know that as long as I stay relaxed I my head will stay above water with little or no effort.
Fisherman in boats (kayaks and other small crafts) are just as susceptible to “spring fever” - the urge to get out, without appreciating the deadly lure of cold water.
I have to challenge your thinking. “Be a swimmer” is the first item on the americancanoe.org safety checklist for good reason. A PFD is not a substitute for swimming skills just as seatbelts and airbags are not a substitute for driving skills.
Your recent swim was a specific situation and cannot be generalized to all rivers. In your case you were not alone, your river was narrow, you didn’t swallow water when you fell in, you didn’t run into any immovable objects in the water and apparently the river bank was friendly and let you get out. Your huffing and puffing comment suggests you didn’t have a lot of extra energy available to deal with a more complicated situation.
The scariest river (for me) that I’ve seen this year is the Big Muddy. Plenty of current (around 5 mph) with slippery banks and pretty much nothing to grab. I think it could easily kill a strong swimmer with a PFD but at least swimming skills might give a little more time to maybe get lucky and find something to grab.
Even on a medium size river like the St Joseph, if you end up in the water it would be all too easy to choose the wrong bank to swim towards and end up wasting precious energy.
A good pfd will keep an incapacitated swimmer’s head above water.
Conscious swimmers, if not in a state of panic, will flip and float, assess the circumstances, and make measured decisions.
Bottom line is that water is more powerful than any of us can ever hope to be. Don’t fight the current. You’ll lose.
Paddling pfds, the ones most people use and are Coast Guard approved, do not keep the head of an unconscious person above the water.
That is a different type of PFD and a very different discussion.
Don’t shoot me! All I look for is one that feels comfortable and is USCG approved. Hopefully they can comb the beaches for my corpse, rather than dredge the bottom.
It is actually too easy of a mistake to make. People who are weak swimmers and new to paddling will tend to assume that what the CG recommends is the most protective version possible.
Encountered someone who could not swim and wanted to paddle with my bunch, an adult who felt that just having the PFD was enough. He went on a trip one time with my husband and a couple of friends - I was busy that day. He slipped in 3 or 4 feet of water just getting out of the boat for lunch and had to be helped out.
He was told no more going with them unless he got swimming lessons.
No problem - it is always a judgement call on when to float and when to swim.
For me, I am usually on relatively narrow, fast moving rivers. As a general rule, if you are in-between rapids, and can flip over and get yourself to shore, that is what you should do. Get out before you get into even more difficult water. Agree that things are different on bigger rivers or in open water.
Two things I never meant to imply:
Swimming replaces your PFD.
It’s OK to paddle someplace alone that you can’t swim out of alone.
Celia - several years ago I had to help a woman in the YMCA pool that fell off her pool noodle and freaked out and screamed “help me”. Apparently adults are not required to pass any swim test like preschoolers are.
I think it’s pretty clear that weak swimmers can get themselves in trouble. I also think that there are very few swimmers that are string enough to not be at risk of exhaustion during a real emergency. For me even when I was swimming 3x/week I know it would be easy to use up my energy swimming in a PFD with clothes on and maybe wrestling a swamped boat and once you’re exhausted in the water it’s hard to recover. I’ve used up almost all of energy in the water several times and I think it’s all too easy to do.
I think of the risks like a basket. We all have a basket that carries our risks. The basket is never empty since there are always risks from weather. water. skills, whatever. If the risks fill the basket something bad happens. But there are lots of ways to make the basket bigger like swimming skills, a PFD, bigger boat with more flotation. not paddling alone, etc.
Two sides of the same coin: Swimming can’t replace a PFD and a PFD can’t replace swimming!
I suppose it’s not surprising, but people who haven’t spent much time in and around rivers or oceans often underestimate the power of moving water. With education and experience, we learn to work with the water because fighting it just wastes energy and frequently doesn’t end well.
We have mandatory PFD requirements. Maybe we need mandatory swimming requirements, licensing so people understand when they can go out, restriction zones that prevent kayaking when small craft advisories are in effect, laws making all kayaks self righting . . .
On the local Lake Michigan beaches, starting this year people can be fined if they are caught swimming when the red flags are out. It seems like a sensible approach since lifeguards have been reduced or eliminated and it’s not uncommon for a tragedy to happen on a day when red warning flags are out. I guess we’re lucky that we still have resources to put out red flags.
Frankly, this situation has rendered us surfers as “law breakers”. The best surfing conditions come from hurricane generated groundswells and/or swells from passing nor’easters. If we paid attention to the red flags, we would not be getting much surf. Luckily my "home break’ is not a “bathing beach” because of it’s rocky contours, and does not have lifeguards. I like it that way.
Woe to the surfers that use public beaches. I and other surfers have disregarded and took our chances with getting fined. I got kicked off a beach once when a lifeguard rolled by in a dune buggy just as I was heading out. Most times, I am already outside the break zone and can see the lifeguards driving by.
Summer time surfing makes me a “rebel” sometimes. I don’t like that. This is another reason that I love surfing winter. Way less people and no lifeguards. I take responsibility for myself. Can’t say I have not had scary moments, especially in winter dawn patrols where I am mostly solo or in the company of few spread out die-hard surfers. Actually, had more than a handful. But, it comes with the sport and the venue.
I keep my life insurance policy up so my wife is taken care if anything should happen. As for being fodder for a discussion board, I would be long gone. My wife and boys know what I enjoy and accept that as part of the “husband/dad package.”
Hey, red flags are good. Saving lives, good. A young experienced woman drowned a few years ago in the Great Falls area of the Potomac. If someone had put the rapids off limits, she’d still be alive, but at what point would someone like her rather not be alive.
I’ve had boaters tell me I shouldn’t be paddling around power boats. Give them the right to put it off limits, and I’ll just go someplace else. At what point should we have a National Board of Regents for Evaluation of Risks and Setting Standards in Pusuit of Recreational Endeavors. We register cars, license drivers, set speed limits.
I go out when a “Small Craft Advisor” is posted (I interpret that as 12 ft or less). What the heck, they put a speed limit on the bike trail I used, because people walk on it, but those same people may cross streets with 2 ton vehicles zipping by at 50 mph. I don’t mind, I’m free to do something else. I can just buy a power boat. Its ironic that one person I know thinks the world is overpopulated, yet feels concerned that I might drown in a kayak.
If I’m told what I’m allowed to do, I’ll comply with the law, until I find simething else to do, like hiking. Last time I hiked to a favorite outcrop, they posted a sign: Beware, Natural Hazard Area, Getting Near the Precipice is Dangerous and Could Result in Death from Impacting the Ground. At the bottom, there was a sign, “Caution, Look up for Falling Hilers”. Enroute to the site. There was a sign, "Caution, Deadly Snakes . . . "
@sing, you came to mind . . . “I’d rather break a stained glass window” than tell you to stop kayaking in hurricanes. You really should know better! I mean no disrespect, but what would your mother or father think?
A lone swimmer was arrested for smimming alone, “alone swimming” on a deserted beach during the “Covids Episode”. Wouldn’t it be great to have that kind of power over other humans. Nothing happened to the people who bred it to infect humans, but a lone swimmer was interrupted in his “pursuit if happiness” during a terrible time, and they said sunlight was a disinfectant. Tell me what to do and I’ll comply. I caught it and never even saw a bat.
