I had an interesting experience with risk taking this weekend. However, in retrospect it is not "risk taking" at all it is "lack of knowledge" or the "ignorance is bliss" problems. Two friends came into town and wanted to borrow my kayaks. Both are extremely athletic. Neither had any kayaking experience. One should have known even better as he is a merchant ship officer with years at sea. To my horror, I turned around to see them push off without life jackets (stowed under their feet). They proceeded to cross boat traffic inn the bay and I lost sight in the haze. It was a bit choppy and I worried the whole time because neither had a clue how to do a rescue. Well, they came back fine, loved kayaking, blah blah. I smacked them both. Why do I say this? They had no clue of the problems they could encounter. No Clue. Surprisingly, I have learned a lot of what not to do from NTSB death reports. When I was still running ships I read them religiously, this guy got crushed, that guy got burned, that ship exploded, this one crashed, another one sank with all hands etc. Morbid stories but they are thoroughly investigated and you learn a ton of "I never thought of that" things. Articles in Sk magazine help that as have some of the tales on this list. You cant really anticipate what you will encounter until you allow yourself to be educated. Until then you are happy and ignorant. Flying a new plane, without an instrument rate license, at night, with 2-3 miles visibility closing? Everything probably seemed fine, low risk, but when you read a lot of NTSB reports on plane crashes, there is an overwhelming number attributed to inexperience ie. ignorance is bliss. Was that the problem on Friday night? It is not our position to speculate at this point but I bet the small plane pilots out there will learn something when they finish the investigation. Unfortunately, it was another night helos and C130's flying over my house and you knew someone wasnt going to be at the dinner table that night. Tom Rhode Island *************************************************************************** PaddleWise Paddling Mailing List Submissions: paddlewise_at_lists.intelenet.net Subscriptions: paddlewise-request_at_lists.intelenet.net Website: http://www.paddlewise.net/ ***************************************************************************Received on Mon Jul 19 1999 - 08:09:45 PDT
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