[Paddlewise] March Madness

March Madness and I am not talking about NCAA tourney basketball (for
non-North Americans, this is the time of college basketball finals which is
often termed March Madness).  I am referring to the tendency of Northeast
paddlers to be caught out on yet very cold waters ill equipped to deal with
it.

Our local NYCkayaker listserve contains a newspaper account of a fellow who
lucked out in a bad situation while paddling last Sunday ill prepared for
conditions.  He was paddling just slightly north of the NYC limits on Long
Island Sound from the Westchester side to the Long Island Side and Nassau
County, a distance of about 3 or 4 miles in this part of the Sound.

He did some vital things wrong:
--Had no cold water clothing despite water still probably in the high 30s,
certainly not more than 40F.
--Ignored wind conditions that would make his return to Westchester nare
impossible
--Carried no spare anything.
--No VHF radio

He lucked out in the following ways:
--He managed to land on the rocks of a lighthouse, Execution Rocks
Lighthouse.  If he had gotten caught further out and capsized, the cold
water would have done him in.
--He had 3 flares with him.  He shot them off and each one actually worked
with the last one finally drawing the attention of a passing tug and barge
(these are active commercial waters that form the backdoor entrance leading
down to NY Harbor).

Just a couple of observations from me:

1. He indeed was lucky with the flares.  I tend to consider flares as just
window dressing to satisfy US Coast Guard regs since these safety devices
are highly unreliable in terms of actually shooting off properly plus their
burn and hang time is so slight that it would depend on someone actually
looking your way for the few seconds effectiveness of your flares in order
to know something is amiss.  More and more, I see handheld VHF radios as
performing the vital distress safety function, although you should still
carry flares, signal mirror, smoke flares, etc.

2. He apparently has paddled this area numerous times.  Familiarity breeds
contempt or certainly a relaxed awareness and over-confidence.  I have
paddled that area often in the last 10 years and  frequently enough the
winds are quite adverse for a return passage; the weather radio and even TV
was talking about the high wind velocities and the directio.  I was once
paddling with a group and one woman simply did not have the strength to
paddle against it.  I sent the rest of the people on to other spots on our
intended tour while I stayed with her behind a few large rocks in the water
where I fed her lunch and water to revitalize her.  Luckily the winds let up
a bit and, with the long feeding and hydration break we had, we were able to
continue on back.

ralph diaz
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Ralph Diaz . . . Folding Kayaker newsletter
PO Box 0754, New York, NY 10024
Tel: 212-724-5069; E-mail: rdiaz_at_ix.netcom.com
"Where's your sea kayak?"----"It's in the bag."
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