But it was hard to find a winner in this article. Between the folks on the boat who “knew how to respond”, the complaints about signals and the way the boat sunk…
No one died or even ended up getting hauled to the hospital, so here it is for morning entertainment.
Nice that no one was hurt. My brother in law had to summon help about 20 years ago after his fishing boat began taking on water in the Gulf of Mexico. They were all fine too.
Here is a recent kayak accident that didn’t turn out well. Maybe it needed its own thread. I wonder what exactly got caught on the rocks to keep her under…spray skirt?
After searching for the answer, here it is, “When Mills flipped and came out of her kayak, her spray skirt — an essential piece of gear used to seal oneself in the kayak — got wedged between rocks that are normally deep under water. She was stuck face-down, according to Atwell.”
The loop on the sprayskirts usually have a plastic tube that stiffens them to make them easier to find and pull in an exit. This is a freak event, but under very specific circumstances it could catch. It is tragic and I am sorry for her family and friends.
That’s enough to make you want to carry a dive knife in your pocket, ugh
I do. Whether I would have the presence of mind to use it if I was trapped like that, or maybe even be able to get to it, is another question.
2 Likes
I always have a knife on my PFD in white water. I mostly have one when daytripping. Never when I am surfing as i am wearing an impact vest and not a PFD.
Way, way back when I first got in kayak surfing, several of us went (try) to surf a beach break. A lobster trap got blown in to break, along with the tethered float. The float line stretched bare under the surface for about 25 yards. I surfed over without incident. But if someone were to capsize and get dragged along by his kayak… Anyway, despite being drilled not to mess with lobster equipment, I paddled out to the line and quickly cut it, in between oncoming waves.
Probably should get a knife on my impact vest.
sing
3 Likes
In a Chamonix a couple weeks ago, they were dropping tourists in inner tubes and fins into a raging river through the city.
I was a little gobsmacked because if they got caught on something they would have lost an appendage.
The water was milky from the glacier melt and who knows what has been thrown in an urban river.
Having gotten to Chamonix, I suspect that risk tolerance is on the high side there. I was impressed when I found out the harnesses the skiers were wearing were so that they could get pulled out if they fell into a crevace skiing down from Mt Blanc.
Tougher skiing than I can do…
1 Like
My sister and nieces were paragliding almost everyday but I used my dog as an excuse not to 
I might have done it had I known who the heck I’d be strapped to but I’m not in to trusting random people I don’t know.