Difference between an emergency rescue and a cold dunking. Watching the video makes you wonder what in the world is going on. At first I thought the guy was pinned in the strainer, and then it slowly becomes obvious he could have climbed out. A one hour rescue practice class and practice in self rescues in rivers and you never would of heard of the first two. One also sees the value in upper body strength and the knowledge and experience in what to do in moving water. Cold moving water easily overwhelms the inexperienced. I get the feeling watching the woman in Kayak #1 this is probably her last kayaking adventure.
@willowleaf said:
We just had two young women kayakers flush over a major dam on the Ohio in a tragic accident this weekend here in Pittsburgh. One body recovered, one still missing. No word on their experience level, but you can see by the width of the river and the type of “blind” spillway that it is not a place to approach for the unprepared. Had they understood the route they would have been far to the lock side.
That’s horrifying.
Yes - low head dams are scary. A friend of mine came real close to getting stuck in this one. The line is on the left on the near side of the picture. He went sideways through the middle and got stuck in the recirculating current.
As the boat started to get pulled back in he bailed out, and used his paddle to push off the face of the dam, which was just enough to get him back into the downstream current. The boat got sucked in, and never came out. It probably got stuck in debris at the base of the dam. Boy, was he lucky…
Here’s a pic of how a nearby town to mine ended a low head dam problem: During a drought years back, concrete for twelve feet below the remains of the old rural tannery dam was poured and set. The grabby suck holes and hazards were thus eliminated. Now during high water, I sail right over the ledge like it’s just an aqua speed bump. People even swim and wade there in summer
I just got back from two weeks in Yorkshire, England where I paddled the Rye and Derwent Rivers with a local paddling club. In Europe they tend to make low head dams into that kind of built out weir which allows boaters to safely drop over. The extended low angle ramp reduces the turbulence at the base to a manageable level. This shot is one of two that we encountered on our outings. I was paddling a Pakboat folding kayak so I just portaged the 22 lb boat (the soft hull would have dragged too much on the ramp) but the other kayakers and canoeists all slipped over the weir. The notch in the middle creates a smooth tongue for boaters to use. Unfortunately, at this one it was blocked by a big snag so they dropped the boats sideways over the lip to the left and pivoted the bow once over.
One of the two young kayakers who capsized at or over the dam here in Pittsburgh on the weekend has yet to be recovered and her family is asking boaters to join the search for her. Since her swimsuit top and PFD were found not far downstream I fear she is trapped in the boil and snags below the dam. It’s a heavily traveled industrial stretch of river and has been heavily searched for several days with rescue boats and drones with no other sign. Flow on the Ohio is fairly low right now, around 30th percentile, so I doubt she would have been swept farther than her boat and gear.
I worry that the public appeals for recreational boaters to participate may lead to further tragedies – the low pool boil at that dam extends out about 100’ and I don’t think many people realize how deadly a downstream approach can be. It’s very common for additional fatalities to occur to would-be rescuers in these circumstances. In fact that may have been how the original tragedy occurred since there are launch sites directly below the dam and the paddlers seem to have been newbies. The river is quite wide and hazard marking is not that obvious to the inexperienced.
A friend emailed me the request for volunteers and I’m torn about turning out. I’m sure it would make the poor family feel better – they have set up a vigil on shore – but I suspect it will be a vain effort. And this is not one of my favorite stretches to paddle – heavy industry along the shore and lots of big barges, plus nasty shoals at this low gauge.
I have to wonder if they could have survived had they been wearing PFDs.
http://www.post-gazette.com/local/city/2017/05/22/Helene-Brandy-Brittany-Evans-kayakers-last-final-photo-dam-Ohio-River-Pittsburgh/stories/201705220154
Tough call about the volunteer search. If the missing paddler is trapped below the dam, could anyone even see the body?
What is it about finding a body? Closure?
I mean, the person either faked their death because they wanted to start a new life or they’re dead and their body will turn up or perhaps not. Why is there so much money, time, effort and RISK put into recovering bodies?
Because all human life is important.
@Sparky961 said:
What is it about finding a body? Closure?I mean, the person either faked their death because they wanted to start a new life or they’re dead and their body will turn up or perhaps not. Why is there so much money, time, effort and RISK put into recovering bodies?
Closure. Like no man left behind.
Jackets should be mandatory unless sanctioned race with spotters.
I agree. Even though my kayak can not sink it doesn’t mean some drunk fool won’t run me over on his jetski.
@DrowningDave said:
I agree. Even though my kayak can not sink it doesn’t mean some drunk fool won’t run me over on his jetski.
Just like the Titanic: Unsinkable.
Well, someone had to say it. 
Still makes my point. Human error (or stupidity). 
@Rookie said:
I have to wonder if they could have survived had they been wearing PFDs.
You are always better wearing a PFD, but in a big hole there is some debate about whether a PFD keeps you in the middle of the boil where you will continue to get recirculated rather than letting you get pushed to the bottom where the downstream current is more likely to flush you out. I always wear my PFD, and that’s not something that I ever want to test in person.
Tough call about the volunteer search. If the missing paddler is trapped below the dam, could anyone even see the body?
Trapped in debris below the dam? Probably not. What a tragedy. I do feel for the families.
Look at that dam on Google Earth and you will see the massive extent of debris and flotsam below the weir. And also the huge extent of the recirculating boil. We have had similar accidents in and around Pittsburgh at the multiple dams on our three huge rivers, with bodies and even entire boats trapped for weeks, and some permanently, in the boils. These rivers are feeders to the Mississippi, with massive volume and an incredible amount of debris below the surface, including entire barges (you can see some on Google Earth) and even a World War II bomber.
I’ve been “maytagged” myself in a huge whitewater hole (“Particle Accelerator” at the base of Coliseum on the Cheat River Canyon in high water Class V conditions) for what seemed like forever (though my buddies watching on the downstream shore reported that I seemed to recirculate only 5 or 6 times). I had on a helmet and PFD . And, when my partner in the two man raft we were in was ejected after we bounced off a rock entering the top of the rapid and we blew shifting our line to the right, I had made the split second decision to drop my paddle and make a death grip with thighs and both arms on the raft. I was able to catch quick breaths as I was roiled to the surface a couple of times but was just about to let go of the raft and try to swim out of the bottom of the hole when the raft and I shot out of it, miraculously upright. The holding force of such hydraulics is staggering. The water is so aerated at the upper levels that your flailing gets you nowhere.
With the Ohio at relatively low levels, there is a possibility that the kayaker’s body, if it escaped the boil, has hung up on the extended sandy shoals along the inside curves of the river. These are areas that would be best inspected by kayak since power boats draft too deep to approach these shallows (we kayakers prefer them for that reason – out of the traffic lanes). So if they are still asking for volunteers I will probably show up.
As to families’ strong impulses towards body recovery, there is the 1999 example of the young woman trapped for months in a recirculating hole on the Chattooga River in Tennessee. Her bereaved father insisted that the river be temporarily dammed in order to reduce flow so her remains could be extracted – the effort went badly the first time and additional lives were almost lost when rescue personnel were swept into the rapids. They tried again and were able to drain the water level enough to inspect the hole, but this was 3 months after the death and all they found were some disarticulated bones down stream, eventually identified as hers. It was determined that she had likely been trapped by a snagged log wedged in the recirculating hole. The story of the recovery effort is halfway through this narration: http://kudzutelegraph.com/2009/11/the-girl-in-the-river/
The two drowned kayakers posted a selfie in their bikini tops (no PFD’s) to Instagram just minutes before dropping over the dam which, judging from the location of the bridge in the background, is less than half a mile ahead of them. Talk about being oblivious to hazards on your route. http://www.post-gazette.com/local/city/2017/05/22/Helene-Brandy-Brittany-Evans-kayakers-last-final-photo-dam-Ohio-River-Pittsburgh/stories/201705220154/
Wow. How terribly sad. Such young beautiful women.