Re: [Paddlewise] JFK Jr. and Risk Taking

Nick Schade wrote:
> 
> You are only risk taking when you know it is a risk, otherwise you are just
> out having a good time.  [snip]
> Maybe it was failure to properly assess circumstances, but even the best
> trained, most experienced and conservative "experts" in any skill will make
> mistakes. I expect  John Jr. was not much different from the rest of us. He
> wanted to get somewhere and he didn't feel like changing his plans.
> 
> We have all been in this situation before. We have all done things
> hindsight suggests were not smart, but we survived. In many cases the
> experience taught us how to do it right and help us learn what are limits
> are. We were lucky and we benefitted from the fact that the worst does not
> always happen.

Right on, brother Schade.  Except for dumb luck and strong arms, my soul might
have preceded JFK, Jr.'s into the great beyond.

Maybe a way for us to make the best of this tragic event is to 'fess up and
lay out for the multitudes an example of how serendipity (the Gods, dumb luck,
etc.) spared us.  Here's mine:
---
As a paddler of three months experience, I set off with my oceanographer buddy
across the sunny, calm Columbia River to an island some seven or eight miles
of open water away.  On circumnavigating it and another, lunch was consumed on
the downstream, westerly end of a third island, still some 3-4 miles of open
water from a protected shoreline, and exposed to some 15-20 miles of goodly
fetch.

Mindlessly snarfing down my lunch, I noticed the wind was picking up, and lo
and behold, as we launched, it turned into a spiffy 15-20 knot headwind,
quartering against us from the right, bringing with it short-period 2-3-foot
seas, occasionally breaking.  We bulled our way through it, consuming some 2.5
hours to traverse the open water, taking it in our chests, faces -- slapping
the water at a merry pace.

Fun day, no?  Would be today.  I had no immersion protection clothing (did not
even own any), was wearing a T-shirt and shorts, and had absolutely no bracing
skills.  I had practiced a wet exit and paddle-float re-entry, but the latter
technique would have been very difficult that day.

Oh, yeah, I had lived near this water for twenty years at the time, and had
acquired detailed knowledge of the couple dozen hypothermia-related drownings
which had occured over the two decades.

Dumb -- and if I had bought it, others would have clucked their tongues about
my improvidence.  I'm glad to be here, to tell the story.

---
Dave Kruger
Astoria, OR
a humble guy, in the face of anyone's death

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