RE: [Paddlewise] River Death from July

  I've forgotten what the occasion was some years ago, but I remember
searching for a rescue drysuit in a SAR catalog and finding one with
a series of stiff rings imbedded in the legs.  Evidently there had been
problems in the past with a person getting flipped upside down with too
much air unburped in the suit.  It would go to the legs and keep him
permanently upside and unable to get his head to the surface. The rings
supposedly helped prevent that.
   I had never heard of this before and have yet to come across it.

Regarding the helmet, I remember Charlie Walbridge holding forth years ago on what should
not be design elements in a whitewater helmet.  Alas, many of them have
crept back into modern designs...

Joe P.

  

-----Original Message-----
>From: MATT MARINER BROZE <marinerkayaks_at_msn.com>
>Sent: Oct 4, 2013 12:43 AM
>To: Paddlewise <paddlewise_at_paddlewise.net>
>Subject: RE: [Paddlewise] River Death from July
>
>I once failed to roll on the first try because my full brim hat, that was
>strapped under my chin to keep it from blowing off, acted like a bucket once I
>lifted my head out of the water. One of the pictures of the victim made me
>think that the flared helmet could certainly act like a bucket
>
>I've never had any trouble with baggy sleeves, but when I first got a drysuit
>I wasn't squeezing enough air out of it when I put it on. the air in it acted
>like multiple PFD's, in that, when I was knocked over in the surf my torso
>would be floated over to one side. No problem if that was the side I wanted to
>roll up on. If it wasn't I would find myself in a catch 22 situation. While I
>could roll on either side, the catch was that in the process of moving my
>paddle to roll on the other side I would end up also flipping my torso over to
>the wrong side again, and again, and again. Each time I tried to switch sides
>with the paddle my torso would switch sides to the new wrong side as well.
>
>I solved the problem by putting two life jackets on in the practice pool and
>working on finding a solution. After many failed attempts in the deep end of
>the pool I found myself in the shallow end of the pool where I couldn't reach
>the paddle downward to try to scull myself over to the other side like i had
>been trying. The solution turned out to be quite simple. If you find yourself
>floated up on the wrong side from how you are set up to roll simply take a
>short paddle stroke across the deck with the blade perpendicular to the deck
>(from the start of the screw roll position). That flips your body over so it
>floats up on the other side from where it was. Next feather your paddle and
>slip it back under your deck while keeping the blade parallel to your deck.
>That puts you back in the roll start position on the side where it will be
>especially easy to roll because you are floating on the surface on that side
>already.
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