Re: [Paddlewise] [cpc] Lake Erie kayaking death

Dear JOG,
    I'm very sorry to hear about your friend Rhino's death.
    Your analysis below looks on target to me.
    We all continually face the condition of overheating while paddling in cold water. My
thoughts on some things to do:
1. Dress for the water. This means not only wearing required clothing and gear, but having it
on, and on properly (zipped).
2. To reduce overheating, paddle easier, shorter, take breaks, drink regularly, splash water
on self  (or roll) occasionally.
3. Be humble. Inform members of your group immediately if you're getting very hot or very
cold. Cramping or shivering are key signs of danger.
4. Alter group and individual paddle plans to protect paddler in distress.
5. Paddle alongside paddler showing or relating distress.
Al Kubeluis

Jack Martin wrote:

> On Saturday, 28 November 1998, Thanksgiving Day weekend,
> Captain Tom "Rhino" Hancock died on Lake Erie off Cleveland,
> Ohio, where he had spent the holiday with family.  "The Rhino" was
> an old Navy buddy of mine, and had taken up paddling only during
> the last year. Following that incident, I wrote up some preliminary
> reports on his death, but wanted to wait until the Coroner's and the
> Ohio Department of Natural Resources' report was released to put
> out the final, official word.  Bureaucracy has relented, that report
> has now been released --- and there are no real surprises.  (Please
> accept the originator's permission to reprint or pass this post on to
> other paddlers in its complete form.)
>
> For a brief review, Rhino went out on a solo paddle to "the crib", a
> highly visible structure about three miles offshore that serves as an
> undewater inlet for Cleveland's water supply.  It's something of a
> landmark in the area, apparently.  (He had tried to go out to the
> crib three weeks earlier, but had turned back because of fatigue.)
> The day of his death, he was wearing a blue drysuit, a yellow type
> III PFD, skirt, booties and gloves, and was found three quarters of a
> mile east of the crib, separated from his boat, a yellow over white
> fiberglass Necky sea kayak (hull number GNK08246G298 --- a new
> boat) with his paddle attached to the boat by means of a paddle
> leash.  The water temperature was 50 degrees F. at the crib intake
> point, 35 feet below the surface; we can presume that the water
> temperature at the surface would probably have been closer to 45
> degrees F.  Winds were light and there was only low chop.  The
> boat was found at a considerable distance from the body.
>
> So what went wrong?  We can only speculate, but the air
> temperature was rising during the day through the 50s F., and we
> can guess that Rhino was overheating because, at some point
> during the paddle, he unzipped his drysuit at the top, leaving an
> opening estimated to be six to eight inches long --- not an
> inadvertent failure to snug up of the zipper, but something clearly
> meant to allow thermal venting.  (The relief zipper on his suit was
> closed.)  When he capsized --- reasons unknown --- he was met
> with the cold shock of nominally 45 degree F. water on his face
> and unprotected head followed immediately by a rush of numbing
> water into his drysuit.  (The investigating officer observed that Rhino
> was wearing "a gray tee shirt" under his drysuit; subsequent
> interviews and investigations have not turned up more details on
> what if any insulation he was wearing under the suit, but no amount
> of dry insulation would have provided any effective long term
> insulation with a drysuit flooded by a six inch opening.  The
> flushing of water through an opening of that size would have
> obviated any "wetsuit" insulation effect provided by the membrane
> of the drysuit and even the thickest synthetic pile or wool.)
>
> So the final question: what was the cause of death?  The Coroner's
> report states that Rhino died of "immersion hypothermia and
> drowning".  From some familiarity with cold water paddling, we can
> assume that hypothermia resulted in a loss of physical control
> which then resulted in drowning.  Earlier suggestions of cardiac
> arrest were, apparently, incorrect.  He became hypothermic and
> eventually drowned.
>
> What went wrong?  In this case, there are a few things that jump
> out.
>
>         -  Rhino was a relatively new paddler. (He and I had discussed
> sea kayaking in the past, and I knew that he had been interested in
> becoming involved in the sport; the reports and conversation with
> the family indicated that he did have at least some sea kayaking
> training.  We lost contact after his retirement from the Navy a
> couple of years ago.)  But he had only one year's experience and
> was paddling alone, offshore, in "cold water" conditions.  Whether
> or not we choose to see that as significant in general, it was a
> specific contributing factor in Rhino's death.  Had he been with a
> partner, an assisted rescue might have been attempted; ambient
> conditions were generally benign, other than the water termperature.
>
>         -  While he seemed at least partially equipped for cold water
> paddling --- the new Necky kayak, a drysuit, a skirt, appropriate
> PFD, gloves and booties --- he was not wearing head protection,
> nor was he reported to have had any with him on this trip.  Of much
> greater significance, and we can easily speculate as the prime
> contributor to his death, his drysuit was not fully zipped closed.
> Again, speculation, he may have felt that he would have time to zip
> the suit back up should he encounter trouble.  But the cold shock
> to his unprotected head and the sudden and immediate incursion of
> cold water into the suit --- coupled with the fact that his PFD would
> have ridden up sufficiently to cover the drysuit opening --- probably
> incapacitated him immediately, making it impossible for him to
> close his suit.  (Assuming he could have closed the suit back up
> after it flooded, appropriate thermal insulation --- had he been
> wearing it --- might have extended his survivability to some degree,
> but this seems unlikely.)
>
> Lessons-learned: in "cold water" paddling --- however we choose to
> define "cold" --- a drysuit is of no value if it is not fully zipped at all
> times when on the water.  Adequte head and neck protection in the
> form of a neoprene hood or a hood of Malden Mills "Thermal
> Stretch" or "Rubberized Thermal Stretch" or similar composite
> material, is absolutely essential, and should arguably be worn at all
> times when on the water.  (There are proponents of carrying a hood
> as opposed to wearing one; there is evidence in this case that
> suggests, since Rhino could not close the zipper in his drysuit, he
> might well not have been able to put on a hood, once in the water,
> if he had had one with him.  Of greater significance, once he had
> capsized and was in the water, the initial damage of cold shock
> had begun, with the intense head and facial pain of cold water entry
> and consequent disorientation contributing directly to his inability
> to recover on his own.)  And we can speculate that, even if the
> zipper on his drysuit had been closed, the lack of thermal
> protection to his head and neck --- where a swimmer loses the vast
> majority of body heat in any event --- and the apparent absence of
> thermal insulation under his drysuit would have induced
> hypothermia and resulted in death by drowning almost as quickly
> as it probably did in this case.  Conversely, had he had his drysuit
> fully zipped, had he been wearing a hood of neoprene or
> functionally equivalent composite material, and had he had
> appropriate  thermal insulation under his drysuit, his capsize under
> the existing environmental conditions could easily have resulted in
> a self rescue or a survivable float until assisted rescue could have
> occurred.
>
> The bottom line: I joined a few hundred people --- family and many
> friends --- to bury an old Navy buddy at Arlington National
> Cemetary on a cold, bright morning last December.  The ceremony
> was impressive --- the flag-draped casket on a horse drawn gun
> caisson, an honor guard, a band --- with full military honors and
> taps called away by a bugler.  But it was an unnecessary trip to
> Arlington.  It could have been prevented by the buddy we went
> there to honor.
>
> If something good ever comes out of incidents like this, you've read
> about a preventable death of a fellow sea kayaker, and maybe
> you'll build the contributing factors to the event into your
> preparation for your next trip.  Thanks for reading this note --- I
> hope it wasn't as much of a terrible use of time for you as listening
> to that bugler was for me.
>
> Jack Martin
>
> *****************************************************************************************
> "Good seamanship is using superior judgment to prevent the need to use superior skills."
> *****************************************************************************************

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