RE: [Paddlewise] cold water boating training

I have an older video series on cold-water sea kayaking that our club did in
conjunction with the coast guard. A lot of this stuff is pre-internet mania
days. I must say that for my part of the world, it's kinda like preaching to
the choir. Yes, the boating public and new paddlers still need the message
in their face at some point even these days, but let's face it, you have to
be pretty stupid in my part of the world to not take water temps into
account given the amount of education and media coverage it gets. And a PFD
is just another part of the equation that is also important. Not sure what
goes on over there on the east coast, but at the end of the day, it's gonna
be hard to regulate immersion protection for cold water. Treat it as an
important part of survival strategy, along with PFD's, but it's all part of
the big picture.

If you have done all you can Chuck, what else can you do? I was doing some
research the other day for an editor, talking with individuals and business
ventures that deal with cold water survival and rescue gear. It came to mind
incidentally that our education institutions should teach school-age kids
about some of this stuff. Reinforce the message before graduation.

Doug








Hi All,

 

I have put this off for a long time, having a great reluctance to attack
this problem in a manner that might have some chance of changing minds in
the world of the numerous boating agencies that provide expertise to the
general public. To this point, I seem to have totally failed to have any
impact of any kind on these regulators. The message put out to the public is
"on cold water, wear a pfd!"  They refuse to discuss the cold water gear
that we all use as a matter of routine. Our message of adequate cold water
gear for cold water boating does not reach the vast majority of ordinary
boaters.

 

Without going into details here, do any of you have videos of paddlers
working on recues in cold water-as for example in the "TEST YOUR GEAR" part
of cold water workshops that may be run by your clubs or peer groups? Do you
know of any U-TUBE or other on-line sites that present such demonstrations?

 

I will appreciate any information you may have on this subject.

 

Thanks,

Chuck Sutherland

skimmer_at_enter.net
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