ok, 8-10 of you paddle to an off shore island/ oil rig. when you return to shore there are some mild [2-3ft?] breaking waves, and as one of your members gets near the shore, they perl off the wave, and get "window shaded" and impaled on their paddle [a leg injury ;-]. you are near a road, and i'll make up whatever other "details" you need ;-) a: what's your first plan of action b: how do you decide if the person is capable of continueing on, on their own, or if someone needs to play ambulance driver c: how do you notify the "next of kin" --- ie tell them to meet you at the hospital/ER, without adding undue stress to the callee d: what other factors should be involved/considered e: is this discussion usefull? 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/ ***************************************************************************
I think I learned a little about this kind of thing in 30 years of coppery, 14 of which were spent as a traffic cop investigating accidents. One of the things I learned is never let let the injured party go off on their own, always send someone with them. Don't let an injured party drive. The reason for this is that shock can hit after a long delay and they can lose consciousness in seconds, when it does. If they're driving a car, hurrying to a hospital, this can cause more serious injuries than the initial one(s). Two, after you take care of the obvious injury, _always_ check the rest of the body for other injury. While you take care of the Paddle in the Leg, thing, if you have someone else who is experienced in first aid, have them check for breathing, heart beat, spinal injury, etc. at the same time you are controlling the bleeding. In some cases the most important thing you can do is ignore the bleeding victims and stabilize the scene. In other words make sure a truck doesn't come driving thru' the accident scene killing you and all the victims. This is most applicable in hiway accidents but the principle is the same in getting an injured person off the icy cold water into a place where they can be sheltered from the wind and kept warm as possible. Never trust the victim to know where they are hurt. I've seen people with visible compound fractures of the legs trying to walk, with no idea that they were hurt. Check for their injuries yourself. Work from head to toe and back again, _twice_, if you have time. Fortuneately, most of us are not doctors and are protected from law suits for missing injuries, but one doesn't want to have to live with knowing they missed something serious. Fair winds and happy bytes, *************************************************************************** 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/ ***************************************************************************
Mark writes: > On Fri, 11 Aug 2000, Tina wrote: > > > What troubles me most about Mark's unfortunate accident is the fact that he > > was paddling a 14+ foot touring kayak on a class 3 - 4, 825 cfs, rocky > > whitewater river. When queried, he responded that he'd taken it on class 2 > > i also paddle it with some regularity on class III rivers ;-) I think its entirely possible to take a longer boat down class III rivers. After all the early WW boats were *much* long than they are now. It would IMHO, be dependent on *which* class III, what boat and how well you can handle it. > > rivers, and his friends paddled the same boats through the Grand Canyon, > > (8,000 to 40,000+ cubic feet/ second). > > from the website for this boat: > > <snip> > > > <snip: ww vs. sea/touring kayaks: eg. tracking vs. maneuver, etc..> > > don't confuse "touring" with "sea kayak" ;-) > > > I've heard several sea kayak on ww river disaster stories over the years, > > (a Folbot totalled on a class 2 run, Boy Scouts badly bashing up a troop > > of borrowed glass sea kayaks on the Deschutes), but haven't heard any > > successes. Is this a common practice in some areas? > > Tina Tina, I don't think you hear about success stories as often since that isn't 'news'. I do think that taking a longer kayak down a river takes more caution than say river rafting. Its probably about the same class of caution that a WW paddler takes though. > again, it is mainly a matter of semantics, but in colorado, where there is > an extreme variety of water available to paddle, we recognize 3-4 types of > kayak, recreational [kiwi's etc], whitewater [sub 12 footers], touring > [12-16 ft], andd sea kayaks [16 foot+] ... the prijon yukon expedition is > an extremely popular boat in colorado. I'm also given to understand that in Colorado (esp on the mighty Colorado River) a different scale is used for river class. Around here (Oregon), I was taught the Class I-VI system (VI being by definition unrunnable). Often this gets broken down into II+, III+ or IV-. So - is that true Mark? Are you using a Class I-X scale to describe the river you where running? If so, it all makes more sense. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- snark_at_tulgey.org aka Glen Acord http://www.tulgey.org/~snark if ($snark eq "boojum") {vanish("softly","suddenly")} *************************************************************************** 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/ ***************************************************************************
On Fri, 11 Aug 2000, B00jum! wrote: > Mark writes: > > On Fri, 11 Aug 2000, Tina wrote: > > > > > What troubles me most about Mark's unfortunate accident is the fact that he > > > was paddling a 14+ foot touring kayak on a class 3 - 4, 825 cfs, rocky > > > whitewater river. When queried, he responded that he'd taken it on class 2 > > > > i also paddle it with some regularity on class III rivers ;-) > > I think its entirely possible to take a longer boat down class III > rivers. After all the early WW boats were *much* long than they are > now. It would IMHO, be dependent on *which* class III, what boat and > how well you can handle it. the dancer was about 12.5-13 ft!! but my back ground comes from canoeing, so having 2 blades makes kayaking easy [donning my flameproof suit ;^] <snip> > > > I've heard several sea kayak on ww river disaster stories over the years, > > > (a Folbot totalled on a class 2 run, Boy Scouts badly bashing up a troop > > > of borrowed glass sea kayaks on the Deschutes), but haven't heard any > > > successes. Is this a common practice in some areas? > > > Tina > > Tina, I don't think you hear about success stories as often since that > isn't 'news'. I do think that taking a longer kayak down a river > takes more caution than say river rafting. Its probably about the > same class of caution that a WW paddler takes though. a beginning WW canoeist may be on class I+ water his first year a beginning WW kayaker will often be on class II+ water his first year a beginning WW rafter will be bored on anything less than class III water ~~~~~ [snip] ~~~~~ > > again, it is mainly a matter of semantics, but in colorado, where there is > > an extreme variety of water available to paddle, we recognize 3-4 types of > > kayak, recreational [kiwi's etc], whitewater [sub 12 footers], touring > > [12-16 ft], andd sea kayaks [16 foot+] ... the prijon yukon expedition is > > an extremely popular boat in colorado. > > I'm also given to understand that in Colorado (esp on the mighty > Colorado River) a different scale is used for river class. Around > here (Oregon), I was taught the Class I-VI system (VI being by > definition unrunnable). Often this gets broken down into II+, III+ or > IV-. > > So - is that true Mark? Are you using a Class I-X scale to describe > the river you where running? If so, it all makes more sense. maybe in "the canyon" but here we use I-VI also... this was a III+/IV- but a short duration. my down river canoe is 15'6" --- which makes this boat seem quite nimble ;-) i have done a rough drawing of the rapid, from the top & side views, and put it [temporarily] online at: small [19k] http://www.diac.com/~zen/rap1.gif large [36k] http://www.diac.com/~zen/rap1.gif 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/ ***************************************************************************
Tina wrote: } Subject: [Paddlewise] accident scenerio > What troubles me most about Mark's unfortunate accident is the fact that he > was paddling a 14+ foot touring kayak on a class 3 - 4, 825 cfs, rocky > whitewater river. When queried, he responded that he'd taken it on class 2 > rivers, and his friends paddled the same boats through the Grand Canyon, > (8,000 to 40,000+ cubic feet/ second). ... > I've heard several sea kayak on ww river disaster stories over the years, > (a Folbot totalled on a class 2 run, Boy Scouts badly bashing up a troop > of borrowed glass sea kayaks on the Deschutes), but haven't heard any > successes. Is this a common practice in some areas? Some years ago, Roger Schumann wrote an interesting article for Sea Kayaker about taking full-length sea kayaks down the Grand Canyon. Ravens, I think they were. I think this is the reference: Roger Schumann, "A Grand Idea: Sea Kayaking the Colorado River", _Sea_Kayaker_, August 1995, page 50. It sure sounded like a real success. Roger, are you reading this? *************************************************************************** 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/ ***************************************************************************
> Tina wrote: > } Subject: [Paddlewise] accident scenerio > > What troubles me most about Mark's unfortunate accident is the fact that he > > was paddling a 14+ foot touring kayak on a class 3 - 4, 825 cfs, rocky > > whitewater river. When queried, he responded that he'd taken it on class 2 > > rivers, and his friends paddled the same boats through the Grand Canyon, > > (8,000 to 40,000+ cubic feet/ second). > > ... > > > I've heard several sea kayak on ww river disaster stories over the years, > > (a Folbot totalled on a class 2 run, Boy Scouts badly bashing up a troop > > of borrowed glass sea kayaks on the Deschutes), but haven't heard any > > successes. Is this a common practice in some areas? > > Some years ago, Roger Schumann wrote an interesting article for Sea Kayaker > about taking full-length sea kayaks down the Grand Canyon. Ravens, I think > they were. > > I think this is the reference: > > Roger Schumann, "A Grand Idea: Sea Kayaking the Colorado River", > _Sea_Kayaker_, August 1995, page 50. > > > It sure sounded like a real success. Roger, are you reading this? Yep, I'm hear, better late than never, I guess. I suppose the short answer about taking "sea touring kayaks" down rivers has to do with boat size relative to river size. A big boat (Eddyline Raven, 17 feet by 24") seemed to work fantastic on a big river (the Colorado flowing between 8 and 10,000 cfs). The long answer, which I won't go into here, has to do with the skills of the paddler. I suppose a highly skilled paddler could navigate a Yukon safely down a Class III flowing at only 800 cfs, but I wouldn't recommend it for most boaters and probably wouldn't want to try it myself. Other successes: I do have two friends who took Mariner Coasters (14 feet by 24", fiberglass sea touring "playboats"-- are you there Matt?) down a Class I-II stretch of the San Juan River in Utah that has a couple of fairly straightforward Class III drops. I'm not sure what the flow was, but they did say that it was "scrapey" in places on their week-long trip. The advantage over a WW boat is that they could carry camping gear more easily. The advantage over a raft should be obvious to anyone who has tried to paddle a rubber barge on flat water stretches. The long and short of it, I suppose, is that using touring kayaks in ww can be either stupendous or stupid, depending on the size of the kayak, the flow and character of the river, and the paddling skills of the paddler. Roger Schumann ESKAPE Sea Kayaking co-author Guide to Sea Kayaking Central and Northern California *************************************************************************** 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/ ***************************************************************************
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