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Westwater swim & cluster rescue

31K views 111 replies 49 participants last post by  Phil U. 
#1 ·
I want to be PC about this, but it's not gonna be possible. Holy shit balls it's time for the armchair QB's to take on this mess(myself included).

So many "WHAT ARE YOU DOING?!?!" moments.
https://youtu.be/NJUudJQKNXo?t=4m20s

I have been in WW in the terrible teens. I know the swirls and erratic waves make navigating difficult and it's very intense, but holy F-balls put the swimmer as your top priority! Have your throw rope ready, and teach your passenger how to throw it.

**I have no affiliation to the gent who posted this other than searching for WW vids on youtube.

My heart's still racing.
 
#5 ·
Honest to God, I thought the swimmer was unconscious when he reappeared after Skull. His helmet is just barely visible above the water and you never see any arm movement to indicate that he can swim, even when his head dips under. And when he's finally rescued, it's like the current just delivered him to the raft. I'm not sure if the throw rope had anything to do with it.

Anyhow, if I was swimming and I saw Skull coming up, I'd ditch my boat and swim for shore. There's plenty of flatwater later to catch the boat and even it got lost in the Room of Doom, you could at least ride to the TO on a raft.
 
#6 ·
OMG. Where to begin?????
That was a whole lot of grunting, groaning, flailing of oars, saying fuck, and almost running the poor swimmer over at the end.
My favorite part was in the beginning when the rower was trying to signal a swimmer by pursing his lips together & blowing. Eddying out after making it through Skull by the grace of God and not hauling ass after the swimmer runs a close second favorite.
Did anyone else notice the passenger/rower wearing a garbage bag as splash gear?
Yikes !!!!!
 
#8 ·
jebus h christ!!!! you got to get that guy!!! if you look at his other videos he has a "LOL" of his shitty run through skull, i guess he wasn't worried about the dude that was swimming for 7 minutes... he doesn't even make an attempt to get his boat to the swimmer, and catching that eddy bellow skull, and above??? turn your boat around and start rowing for the swimmer you dink!!
 
#9 ·
That's what it looks like at 15K ? It's so washed out.

No slides into holes above Skull. No real hole at Skull. No big Sock it to me slide.

What's so terrible teens about that ? Didn't look like weird currents jerking the boats around, Raft is OK going through Skull sideways, etc.

I expected to see the swimmer appear with a beer in his hand.

They'd have never got away with any of that malarkey at 8K.
 
#10 ·
I took an internet thrashing not too long ago after a statement that was contextually ignorant of kayaking timing. That said, WTF? Do Go Pros make people stupid? The one major flip I have experienced was watching a friend hit the V- Wave inconsiderately. I had my rescue equipment clipped to me and ready to go within 10 seconds after seeing that and it was friendly levels. This crew took approximately 5 minutes and then did a premature throw, not to mention the distractions before catching up to the kayaker.

I love rafting but this video shows how poorly prepared so many of our brethren can be for serious conditions. I have yet to boat the terrible teens and this is why I have avoided that experience. The ideal is a well oiled machine and this is a team in serious malfunction. I hope I am better aligned with the ideal on this spectrum. That said, long live the fringe season flows!

Phillip
 
#16 ·
Or punched out by their former friends!!! To add to CataraftGirls's comments there were a number of things missing from this scenario. Any rowing skill, any rescue and recovery skill, any initiative etc...Like WTF? And then you put it out there for the world to see. Get some goddamn training from somebody. Buddies or whoever but someone that has a clue of the consequences of sending your buddy for a WAY longer than necessary swim in what i imagine to be quite cold water.
 
#15 ·
Can't say for Kayaks versus rafts. I have run it at 14000 and also at 8000, and I thought 14000 definitely felt pushier, so the video probably doesn't quite do it justice. I did have a pretty heavy boat on the 14k trip.
With that said though, a solid boater in our group ran it in a ducky at 14000 right side up.
What is the most appalling is the lack of real effort at rescuing the swimmer, that could have been a flush drowning so easy.
 
#17 ·
OK. I get flush drowning means that as a swimmer there is a risk that if it gets too rough, you end up sucking water because you can't time your breaths accurately due to turbulent, mixed up water, but the water doesn't look that turbulent even taking into account the high vantage point of the camera. Maybe at the moment he went over the rocks at skull, but not after that. I swam through skull once and cartwheeled about 10 times underwater before being spit up to the surface in the pool below.
Maybe I'm jaded because I was a strong swimmer my whole life and can swim a long ways under water and a lot of people go on rafts or kayaks even though they only have marginal swimming / breath holding abilities or tend to panic ..
Not to belittle the fact that the swimmer is first priority no matter how they became one.
 
#18 ·
rescue your friends-pronto

Yeah, you can't post a video like this and not expect to take some withering criticism :mad: from buzzards everywhere. This video should be a reminder to all boaters how quickly a swim can go from bad to worse-especially if you're not ready to react & rescue right away. Those of us who are kayakers, have ALL swam in easy places on rivers we shouldn't have, and there is plenty of swirly water in Westwater at 15k cfs to make the excuse for swimming from your boat, but the kayaker in the video should've had a much more solid roll for boating Westwater at this higher level. Swimming above Skull is not an option!!:lol:

As for the other rescue boaters, when in doubt, (as if there could be any doubt what to do :confused: ), ditch the gear and really row/paddle for that swimmer! ASAP! NOW! And work on your throw bag technique from time time like everyone else; no excuses for missing a swimmer when you are that close!

So many miles of flatwater below Westwater the last thing I'd be concerned about is rescuing someone's kayak vs. them, especially when they just swam Skull at 15k. Just glad this video didn't have a different ending with all the prolonged swimming; many of the fatalities on Westwater (and other similar big water runs in our region) have been swimmers that have simply 'gotten away' from their group out front after a flip/swim and either flush-drowned or died from hypothermia mere minutes later.
 
#19 ·
You can get sucked under in the squirrely water, the real danger at these levels in my opinion would be a flip in funnel and swimming into skull, it was last year?!? That 2 people died on separate trips on the same day at 21k. The folds at these higher-end flows will suck Swimmer deep.... I've only seen at at 12500 and it was pretty rowdy, funnel falls is 2 big ass holes with reactionaries feeding you into exploding waves, at one point in the trip I remember my left cat tube completely disappeared in a fold in the current, kind of spooky feeling
 
#29 ·
The deaths were in 2015. You are absolutely correct about Funnel - it flipped an 18 foot commercial rig and the smaller private boat that was following their lines. The private boater wasn't pulled in until after Last Chance.

I believe the flow was ~19k (but really +/- 2k not much changes), which I remember because I was telling a nervous first year Sheri guide (who was ROWING customers on the trip) how it is washed out and pretty easy at that level BESIDES Funnel. Funnel has a massive lateral - which is totally avoidable - but very fun if you hit it right @ a -45 degree angle (10:30 on a clock). Rookie guides are taught to "square up" and I suspect the guide went in at 0 degrees (12 o'clock).

The character changes a lot with the flow. Just because Skull washes out does not mean 15k is a walk in the park, clearly these guys got lucky and probably should not have been out there. When people die in WW Canyon, it is almost always in The Terrible Teens. The turbulence does NOT accurately show up in videos.
 
#20 ·
I watched the video again and noticed a few things. The swimmer was a kayaker and there were two other kayakers, as well as two rafts in the group. Was this run over the skill level of this kayaker? With two other kayakers, why didn't they have him corralled and in an eddy? It appeared that one of the kayakers had the swimmer's boat under control. When they got the swimmer in the raft, it looks like he had a rope in him hand. It was a different color rope than the one the rafters were trying to throw him. Must have been a rope from one of the other kayakers? The lady on the raft didn't make a perfect throw, but she wasn't way far off initially. At least she made an attempt. After that it didn't appear that Mr. Go Pro was sure if he should row or get the throw bag and make another throw.

I can't profess to being the best rescue person on the river. There's usually a lot of stuff all happening at once and doing the right thing quickly isn't always instinctual to everyone. But there didn't seem to be a sense of urgency with this group in getting to their swimmer. Both rafts eddied out after Skull to chase gear before going after the swimmer. Maybe they assumed the two kayakers had him? But they didn't and he looked spent by the time he was in the raft.
 
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#21 ·
Water Temperature - Exhaustion or Unconsciousness - Expected Survival Time
50–60° F (10–16° C) - 1–2 hours - 4–6 hours
40–50° F (4–10° C) - 30–60 minutes - 1–3 hours

Double that with core body insulation typical of a kayaker.

Get the swimmer so they don't sustain any injury. But in this case, injury doesn't seem likely.
 
#23 ·
I had a friend flip her ducky in Funnel. I can't remember the water level. Luckily she was hauled into the paddle raft before Skull. They got her pretty quick, but it was a scary swim and she was coughing up a lung for a few days. That swim really shook her, and it took awhile before she wanted to paddle her ducky on whitewater again. No matter what the level, swimming a rapid on WW is no fun and no joke.
 
#24 ·
I flipped somewhere above Skull at pretty high flow and cartwheeled through all of it. The flow was enough that the rocks on the left were way underwater. I held my breath a long time. Everyone below; my partner and a rafter watching couldn't believe I survived. I was missing too long. They all came after me, but I felt fine. To me it was just kind of a long time to hold my breath and be sure and keep the nose plugged.
I think a theme here is the newbie aspect. Inexperienced people shouldn't be doing Class 4. People who aren't strong swimmers shouldn't raft or Kayak. Maybe practice until you can swim across a hotel pool and back underwater at minimum. What if you had to untangle yourself off something like a stick underwater or something ? How long would that take ? Likely longer than swimming back and forth 100' or so underwater if in a current.
 
#25 ·
I have to add too, that worrying about the swimmer in this case took the raft through Skull sideways. At other, not so washed out flows, this would have been a flip and probably put 2 more swimmers in the water.
I'd have to say that Rule #1 = Rescue swimmers with prudence to injury to recuers themselves if a threat of injury to swimmer exists otherwise maintain your craft and re-evaluate at next opportunity.
 
#28 ·
I do agree that you should get yourself safe before attempting to safely rescue others. I'm not convinced that he went backwards & sideways through Skull because he was worried & distracted by the swimmer. After he was through Skull, he definitely didn't have his focus on the swimmer because he & the other raft eddied out to grab floating gear.
 
#26 ·
Westwater swim & cluster rescue

Skull at about 17k was the deepest swim of my life so far. I tumbled underwater for an eternity it seemed at the time. My ears were feeling the pressure as were my lungs. That was an inaugural run in my new 18' Leopard in '98, I was lead boat. I've run it scores of times since, solo several times (not in the teens). Got back on the horse I guess.

At 30k was the only time I've ever watched my two passengers in the DRE flip seats underwater up to their necks in an eddy boil that came out of nowhere. We pirouetted in my 18' by 8' cat. I had/have never experienced that. The run was a blur of waves as the rapids were standing waves and rollers at that level. The rock of shock was obscene. The room had a view of holy f*ck. Other than that, it was point the boat downhill. Was back in Grand Dysfunction by 4:00pm that day (I say that only cause I lived there in the early 80's).




Sent from my iPhone using Mountain Buzz
 
#27 ·
Re: flush drownings. It's all about the cumulative effect of hypoxia (i.e., the deficiency of the amount of oxygen reaching tissues.)

Let's say you're a kayaker getting worked in a hole. You're already breathing hard just trying to stay upright and work your way out of the hole, then you get flipped and expend even more time/energy/oxygen trying to roll. But nothing works so you pull your skirt.

If you're lucky, your head comes up long enough for a quick breath, but just as likely, you get sucked deep for what seems like eternity.

Let's say you're still conscious when you get flushed from the hole. Head pops and you get a deep breath. Amen! But here comes another hole or a breaking wave overhead. Your training kicks in and you start swimming aggressively to avoid the worst of it. Although your head comes up every now and then, you simply can't get enough air in your lungs. And, by swimming hard, you're burning through what little oxygen remains in your lungs/blood/tissues.

Then your buddy arrives to help tow you to shore. Except he's paddling a short, stubby playboat with barely enough volume in the stern to float a six pack. He yells at you to kick like hell and you give it everything you've got and try not to pull his stern down. But you both get pulled into another small hole and he flips so you let go of his boat.

You get flushed by the hole quickly this time, but you're still in the river fighting for air, and while the worst of the rapid is over, there are still deep seams sucking you under or one last wave train to negotiate.

You are breathing so hard at this point, you end up inhaling some water (or maybe it happened earlier in the hole... you can't even remember.) So you start coughing so violently that you black out for a moment and that's when you inhale even more water. Your body convulses a bit, then you stop breathing for good.

Your buddies catch up to you again, but you're not breathing and it's almost impossible to do CPR on a swimmer from a kayak in the middle of the river. So they have to get you to shore. And, damn it! Here comes the next rapid, so that's going to take some time.

A flush drowning is like water boarding without the board or the sadists/torturers/murderers holding you down. It's absolutely terrifying because you're conscious and fighting for air for a very long time. Five or seven minutes might seem like eternity and basically it is, since it's the rest of your life.
 
#33 ·
At only 35 posts from Landslide, this is one of the best write ups I've seen on the buzz. You people have no idea, all this arm chair quarterbacking and shit, this is the real deal. Good on ya Landslide. This is what drowning in vicious cold whitewater feels like, and it leaves little time to rescue and recover. Be on your game and know your shit.
 
#30 ·
Two groups of folks at greatest risk for incidents/accidents: very inexperienced and very experienced. Read "Deep Survival" by Laurence Gonzales. Imperative to review and demo rescue techniques and plans for everyone. First priority: stop, think, observe, plan (happens in a matter of moments with experience); don't become a victim yourself, people first, do no harm, debrief. You have the rest of your life to freak out. I may be preaching to the choir...it's just one more memory tract embedded in our brains for that moment when you or someone else ends up in the drink.
Be safe out there!
 
#31 ·
What the fuck!! They just gonna let their boy swim to Mexico??
I'm sure the video didn't do justice to the pushiness of the water. But damn, when that guy swam the first thing the oarsman did was try to catch an eddy.
Maybe they just really don't like the guy!
What a shitshow
 
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