Re: [Paddlewise] Pfds

Good post Jack...

 A couple of thoughts in my mind stimulated by this and preceeding posts, 
and some personal experiences....

Over the years I have had occasion to pull people who likely would have 
drowned out of the water three times... only once while paddling.  We always 
help fellow paddlers.... it is in our nature to be there.... and there is a 
certain kindred spirit toward others who share our joy of kayaks.... in my 
experience.

Wearing a pfd...


 Any one of us could under unexpected conditions wish we had one one.... 
although we are comfortable in the water... it is a hostile environment.  A 
pdf not only helps prevent drowning, it also helps prevent hypothermia.  It 
also makes it easier for us to help someone else in distress by the extra 
floation it may provide us if we need to get in the water to assist someone.

 It gives us throwable flotation in an emergency.

It provides some level of protection from trauma.. such as another boats bow 
plowing into your side.

It provides redundancy of safety measures in that hostile environment... and 
safety is largely not a one tiered system but system of reduncies/fail safes 
when the first tier fails.

 All systems fail sooner or later, hence redundancy is smart.  Good skills 
are important... but not fool proof in unexpected situations/conditions, 
since sooner or later something unexpected happens.

This is not combat... it is recreation... therefore the level of risk by 
sensible people should be minimal.  Accident records most often show that 
paddling in conditions beyond your skills, paddling without proper safety 
equipment are often the cause of preventable loss of life or near misses.

Seems simple ... have fun, minimize unnecessary risk, and help others out 
when they need it...(doing so also helps your own skills imho. :)

Mike O.


> From: "Martin, Jack" <martin.jack_at_solute.us>
> There was a time when I would have risen to debate much earlier in this 
> thread.  But I do now rise -- or at least react -- to Darryl's comments 
> because I found myself bristling a little when I read the statement above. 
> At first, anyway.  In the early days of PaddleWise, I'd have condemned 
> this attitude of justifiable neglect for another paddler.  But I take 
> Darryl's point: maybe we're not our brother's PFD-keeper.  Is there 
> something in life that *requires* us to take disproportionate personal 
> risk to compensate for another's ambivalence or indifference to his or her 
> own risks?
>
> For me, thirty years in the U.S. Navy -- quite a few of them as a Navy 
> CSAR helicopter pilot, flying into bad-guy territory to bail out the 
> military's versions of kayak-idiots who wouldn't carry a full bag of 
> survival equipment on their PFDs -- developed an uncomfortable but firm 
> personal belief that we still *do* have to take care of the idiots of the 
> world.  That we really *are* our brothers' and sisters' PFD-keepers. 
>  Okay -- maybe there's a difference between being a search and rescue 
> professional and just being a drive-by paddler witnessing a 
> fellow-kayaker's distress. But it doesn't work that way for me.
>
> I kinda wonder if Darryl -- or any PaddleWiser -- wouldn't unhappily do 
> much more than "the bare minimum" for a foundering kayak-idiot -- with or 
> without a PFD or the motivation or intent to wear one.  Faced with that 
> disaster-in-the-making, my guess is that he -- and all of us -- would 
> do -- if begrudgingly -- everything possible to help our less-equipped or 
> less-experienced kayak-idiot to get the dry side up and the wet side down. 
> Yes, possibly even taking a disproportionate personal risk in the process. 
> Unless someone can cite an experience of actually paddling away from 
> another kayaker's train-wreck on principle, I'm going to continue to 
> believe that any of us would go well beyond "the bare minimum" if we were 
> actually placed in that situation, and would pull out the kayak-idiots of 
> the world even as they might not deserve in a legitimate Darwinian 
> scenario.  'Cause that's what we *do*.
>
> Joq
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