RE: [Paddlewise] Landing a victim through surf

Jack,

 One cautionary note - trying to handle a person through surf (breaking
waves over three feet tall) can be quite difficult if you are not a
_strong_ swimmer and practiced in life guarding skills.  This is a good
one to practice with a friend on a day with some good waves on a soft
sandy beach.  The old rescue adage always applies - don't create another
victim.....  Most of the people that I have paddled with were better
paddlers than they were swimmers. 
 As far as flotation for the victim - I think that a person wearing a
PFD has plenty of flotation (from the swimming rescuer's point of view),
but there may be instances where extra flotation could be beneficial.
If the victim is hypothermic yet somewhat functional it would be very
helpful to have them hold onto an inflated paddle float, but if the
hypothermic victim is unconcious or unable to handle simple motor tasks
then the rescuer is going to have to support the victim.  This is where
some of the lifeguard's tools really work well, but it might be hard to
find effective substitutes among normal paddling gear.  I think that I
would simply rely on the flotation provided by my PFD rather than trying
to hold onto both the unconscious victim and a flotation device.
 Another thought that I had about this idea of swimming the victim in is
that the direct exposure to the water is going to accelerate the
hypothermic reactions making it even more critical to begin quick and
effective treatment of the symptoms once on shore.
 A very thought-provoking scenario....thanks Julio!

Dave Seng
Juneau, Alaska

> -----Original Message-----
> 
> In a message dated 98-11-06 10:34:44 EST, kolsen_at_imagelan.com writes:
> 
> << Around here there tend to be 3 choices of equipment for the life
> guards,
>  a double handled "torpedo", an oversized flotation belt with a short
> (roughly
>  3 foot) tow rope with shoulder loop, and an overstuffed surfboard.
>  
>  In dumping waves I would probably chose the retrieval belt.  The
> harness
>  loop goes over the rescuers shoulder and the flotation belt goes
> around the
>  swimmers chest, the swimmer then gets towed in backwards.  With the
> short
>  tow rope you get to keep the swimmer away from you. >>
> 
> then Jack wrote:
> Can you translate the above into what an average sea kayaking group
> can best
> do with equipment at hand --- and that's probably not more than a
> paddlefloat
> or two and maybe a contact tow line --- to get this guy to the beach,
> Kirk?
> How does what he's wearing --- a PFD, maybe a neoprene farmer john and
> a
> helmet --- influence what a lifeguard would do?  Given what our group
> probably
> has to work with, and assuming the surf was too big and the victim too
> weak to
> effect his own landing in any reasonable safety --- both to himself
> and to
> others --- how do we adapt your surf lifeguard techniques and
> equipment to
> save this guy's life?
> 
> Jack Martin
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