for those new to this discussion, paddlewise is an international boating list, primarily aimed at and consisting mostly of sea kayakers, but there are many others from all ends of the paddle sports spectrum. I am also copying two of our local Canoe clubs on this. Sorry about any duplicates. My observations of this accident are at the end, and I don't really descibe the injury in detail!! On Thu, 20 Jul 2000, Frank Lucian wrote to PaddleWise: > Speaking of broken paddles, an instructor (who works at a retail shop) > recently was telling me that he had never seen a two-piece paddle break > in the middle, and that they were actually stronger than one-piece > paddles due to the inner sleeve that holds them together. I had always > assumed that one-piece paddles were the strongest. Any thoughts or > experiences out there? > > Frank i broke a 2 piece this weekend, the male end broke off right at the joint. clean break, while in the middle of a class III+ rapid. then a paddle half hit a rock and was impaled through my leg... ok not all the way through ... let's start at the beginning-ish [oh, please excuse typo's, still at home on pain killers <8-]# this is from memory 48 hrs old, although i've been mostly unconcious since i got home saturday night. DELETE now if you don't want the "gory" details ... This weekend was the Rocky Mountain Canoe Club's annual River Rendezvous. Due to last minute changed plans, I was able to get away for a day's paddle with them, Saturday. I drove up to the middle Colorado River, to find the shuttles all starting to leave. I found a trip on the schedule board, and jumped in my car after them. It was one I had never paddled. We were to paddle from ?Catamount to Twin Bridges, a 12 miles piece of river, dotted with a few significant rapids. Catamount [II+] was first. Our group of 4 tandem canoes, 1 touring kayak & 3 solo canoes all made it through fine. the sun was shining, the temperature was warm, and the water was cold, what a beautiful day. Over all the water was low for this t ime of the year. It made some areas very shallow and rocky, and many rocks stuck out of the water where other paddlers didn't remember them before. The water was running at about 825cfs while we were there. Rodeo Rapid was the next significant rapid we would encounter. Several people planned on portaging around this one. There was good reason, as it can be a class IV with enough water in it... [for a review of river ratings see http://www.dotzen.org/paddler/cpr/ratings.txt ] I think after re-reading this, my group would agree this rapid was currently a III+/IV- We spent a couple minutes watching a sit-on-top kayak "group" [three guys, one boat] taking turns running the rapid... one by one, those in our group who were running the rapid went. The hardest part is truely a large wave you drop over, and then slam into the wall of a hole at the bottom. Rodeo is right!! Yee Hawwwwwwwwwwwwwww. Up and over you went. Down into a head height wall of water, well bow+ on the open canoes ;-) and then a couple hard pulls through the wall, and then a turn to miss the huge rock, which was now exposed at this water level. then a graceful eddy out to the left, and look back at wht you just came through!! Wheeeeeeeeeeeee!!!! My line at the top was good, I felt good about this, even iin my borrowed helmet [thanks Sammer]. Ok, bow drops, my line is still good, now I hit the wave the sends you into the sky, still a good line, and whooosh, there's nothing infront of me but free fall as my nose drops into the big hole. I just have to punch through and i'll be home free, but there's a bigger diagonal to it that i hadn't seen from the shore, and it pushes me hard right. I'm handicapped, and can't roll, so I've always worked hard on my bracing. Last year I was lucky enough to paddle Maligiaq Padilla for a total of a week, over the course of the summer, so my brace is the strongest it's ever been, or was it? my face was hitting the water, I tried an extended sculling brace, and that's when I realized I had a paddle half in each hand. I tried one last sweep, and then wet exited. Right then it happened, but not so fast I didn't know what was happening, the paddle blade hit a rock and stopped. My body was still moving, trying to get my feet down river, and the end of the paddle, which had been the middle 30 seconds ago, started digging into my leg. I pulled and twisted at the same time, spinning my body away from the rock, but I no longer had use of both legs. When swimming a rapid, the rule is "ALWAYS feet first, but I couldn't get my legs around. Water, lights, voices, all spinning together, but the throbbing of my leg says "GET GOING" ... I pulled back my skirt from my leg long enough to see blood, and was that bone? I blink, and see the kayaker [whose name I never got] pull up along side me, as i finally get my back stroke working... I grab on and help kick/swim myself to the shore. I pulled my skirt back, and showed the kayaker, he whistles quickly, and agrees I'll need help. Luckily I can see it's not spurting, I had missed the femoral artery, thank God. By this time, Dave Allured, our trip coordinator, gets down the shore to me. He assesses the situation, and heads off for the 1st aid kit. Honestly, quite a few folks helped out, which was great. After getting me bandaged up, Dave Jumped into the front of his boat, I jumped/crawled into the stern, and we headed for the other shore, where the road awaited. The same kayaker who pulled me out of the river, also had his car at the riverside. We loaded my kayak ontop of his three, and he gave me a ride to my van. While I chnaged into dry clothes, this good samaritan moved the boat from his car to mine, and tied it down for me. I drove to the interstate, where my cell phone picked up a signal, and called my wife with the bads news. We met at the hospital, as I pulled into the Emergency room four and a half hours after the accident. I wasn't losing blood, and I could still say my ABC's ;-) The Doctors had 6 xrays taken of my leg, and determined there weren't any pieces of my paddle inside my leg. Dr Mark then flushed the wound and sewed my leg closed. It wentalmost to the bone, but my thigh muscle was strong enough to prevent that, the paddle just [1-1.5 inches] went through the fatty tissue. ========================= observations: ========================= The paddle shaft broke cleanly at the joint, where the male end joins the female end, with about 1/16" of the male end left [about 2 threads of the fibreglass] it was a used paddle when I bought it, but used by a paddling school, so used/mis-used quite a bit probably. I won't disclose the mfgr, as i don't know the paddle's history, and i've used it 2+ years myself, only on whitewater/moving water, so it's never seen a "gentle day" out of me, as I have light-weight lake paddles. ========================= The kayakers [to whom I will ever be grateful] were very skilled, and quite calm, their group was a father, his son, and friend of his son, I believe. They were playing there for about 3 hours. They also couldn't believe the guys on the sit-on-top [no helmet, or the appropriate skills] The Father also did recommend the Emergency Room at Frisco as being very nice ;-) from experience he said ;-) ========================= Trip coordinator [Dave] took charge, kept un-needed folks away, got trained folks into scene [Jeanne(sp?), thanks!!] ========================= Lots of stuff happened "behind the scenes" such as all my boat & gear ending up on the opposite bank, and UP to the road. I know the Kayaker's son towed it... but he [the son] was way too small to have carried it up the river bank!! ========================= I was gladd I made the decision to drive to Brighton, as my wife had to drive to the hospital to get me, she wasn't able to find anyone to drop her off, and drive my cra back. She had help from our daughter & friend MUCH later that night. If she'd had have to drive to Frisco [3 hours] it would have been much more difficult for her to have gotten my car back. ========================= I-V's sting no matter how many times you get them. ========================= It took a LOT of painkillers for them to stitch me up... I guess I had tolerated the puncture for the drive, but those tiny little needles really hurt ;-) ========================= throw ropes were appearant to me in folks hands as I floated past, but the noise of the river drowned out all voices, except the kayaker when he told me to grab the rear grab loop, and I told him my leg was in banged up shape. ========================= Ace badages are a godsend for keeping pressure evenly distributed across a wound. LARGE non-stick [tefla type] pads are a must in a 1st aid kit. We used VERY large band-aids, but it wasn't until it was time to take them off that I remembered I'm allergic to the glue on band-aids, so I had 4 raw patches where we crossed the 2 bandages. This was ok, as it kept the bandages from moving around, but still painfull. Waterproof tape stays stuck if it gets wet afterwards, but will NOT stick to a wet leg. Dave had a towel, we dried my leg with that, and the bandaids stuck firmly. ========================= Cell phones or radios are generally useless in the canyons of Colorado, so if you have one, and use one, know where you get a signal. I was able to re-asure my group that I had less than 15 minutes to drive from our parking spot at the take out, to where I could call home/911. I then called my wife at predetermined intervales, so she could track my progress. I was determined to get to our local hospital, rather than stop on the way. I know this bothered some of the group, but I felt I knew myself well enough, that if I were to have problems, I had the senses to recognize it, and pull over and call 911. It was just under 4.5 hours from the time of the accident, until I got to the hospital. I unwrapped the ace bandage to check on blood loss every half hour, and even then, after 4+ hours, i hadn't soaked through the two bandaids to the ace bandage, so I wasn't losing any more blood. ================== wow, i started this 5 hours ago, and took two naps before finishing ... so, thanks to those readers involved directly, and maybe some piece of this helps someone else out in the future. I'll answer any questions I can, but don't expect s speedy reply, as I'm off to bed again. paddle wisely out there follks ;-) mark -- #-canoeist[at]dotzen[dot]org------------------------------------------- mark zen o, o__ o_/| o_. po box 474 </ [\/ [__| [__\ ft. lupton, co 80621-0474 (`-/-------/----') (`----|-------\-') #~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~_at_~~~~~~~_at_~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~_at_~~~~~~~~_at_~~~~~ http://www.dotzen.org/paddler [index to club websites i administer] ---- A smooth sea never made a skillful mariner. -- English Proverb *************************************************************************** PaddleWise Paddling Mailing List - All postings copyright the author and not to be reproduced/forwarded outside PaddleWise without author's permission Submissions: PaddleWise_at_PaddleWise.net Subscriptions: PaddleWise-request_at_PaddleWise.net Website: http://www.paddlewise.net/ ***************************************************************************Received on Mon Jul 24 2000 - 12:24:51 PDT
This archive was generated by hypermail 2.4.0 : Thu Aug 21 2025 - 16:30:28 PDT