Mystery of dead kayakers. This bugs me.

[mistermack]

This is a tragedy involving one family. The bodies of three Kayakers were pulled from the river.
The water was raised, but not in full flood. How can ALL THREE have drowned, in three separate kayaks?
Apologies for linking the Express, but :
http://www.express.co.uk/news/uk/475391 ... g-kayakers

Any theories? I have a kayak myself, so it's a bit personal. They had helmets and life jackets, but I'm not much impressed with their choice of kayak. I would feel safer in a ''sit in'' rather than a ''sit on top''.
But how did they all drown, with helmets and life jackets? They were only going about four miles, downstream.

[cronus]

Chance. With no God to intervene the only guide is a normalised probability curve and things don't always settle in the middle.

[laklak]

Maybe they pissed off Poseidon.

[mistermack]

This is quite an interesting thread, on a kayaking forum, with some posters familiar with the river.
I don't think that they think much of the sit-on-top kayaks either, but they also seem mystified.

http://www.songofthepaddle.co.uk/forum/ ... humberland!

There is a weir, where two bodies were found, but the other was found about a mile UPSTREAM of the weir.
If the incident happened upstream of the weir, as seems pretty certain, it's not surprising that the other two bodies got trapped in the circulating water of the weir.

I used to kayak quite a lot, years ago, without a lifejacket, on my own, on huge lakes, rivers and once on the atlantic. The only precaution I took was being wary of conditions, and a couple of van inner-tubes, shoved up either end of the kayak, so it couldn't sink.

I now feel I was a bit lucky, looking back.

[laklak]

I've got two sit-on-top models, but don't use them in any thing approximating rough water. Mostly they're for floating about the bay with a fishing rod and couple of beers.

[macdoc]

Must a been aliens....

But as a former white water kayaker it's easy enough to get trapped under flow through debris and you drown in place.
Even one of the best kayakers in the world succumbed to that after kayaking the world rivers....some of which will likely never be done again given the risks.

My ex was Canadian downriver champion and she came back from one event really shaken up.....kayaker died right at their feet....his feet were trapped under a ledge and despite shallow water they could not free him in time.
Water pressure is impossible to fight. It's one reason white kayaks are designed to split when pinned. The doctor above built his own ( he was middle aged when running the crazy rivers ) and refused to put in the safety seam and he died pinned into an undercut - had he put a break away in he's likely be alive.

Actually looking at the river involved I don't see any flow through obstacles...they should have just floated down feet first.



Lots of handholds on the kayaks too..





maybe hypothermia...does not take long if light clothes on.

•••

My ex- had friends like this

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lwsC0zHCdz8#t=56[/youtube]

Just yucks they jump off a 100' bridge into the river below. ( with their gear on but sans kayak ) but they would run crazy stuff including waterfalls.
Three of them in downriver kayaks actually ran up the Niagara River to the whirlpool. Silly fucks but very good and that was while ago....boats and gear is better now.

[mistermack]

This is one the same as mine, going down some white water.
There is nothing remotely like this where they drowned, so I'm assuming it's a bit better than their sit-ons.

[macdoc]

More of a pointed inner tube than a kayak..and no - not better than their sit ons....if you can't roll it then its really not a kayak but a variation on an inflatable watercraft......so is theirs.



this is a down river kayak



this is a current whitewater kayak



this was earlier type of slalom and white water





this is a seagoing kayak



All have neoprene skirts to keep water out and can be rolled...even the double.

[mistermack]

I didn't want a white water kayak, or I'd have bought one. I wanted one that would go in the boot.

But I wouldn't take one like theirs down the river in the youtube vid that I linked.
In fact, I wouldn't take mine either, but that's by the way.
I'd rather sit in, than sit on top.

Here's another youtube vid down some white water in the same model as mine.
It's certainly far rougher than what they were paddling in. I still don't get how three could get killed on that little stretch of pretty flat water.

[macdoc]

Inner tubes and inflatables are fine for white water fun at that Class One tho I'd hesitate on calling them kayaks.
Hell that kind is fun with your feet up and a PFD on.

[mistermack]

A white water kayak would be no good for what I want.
If you're going fishing on a huge lake, you don't want something that rolls easily, even if you can flip back up. And you need something a bit bigger, for comfort.

The kayak I had years ago was huge, compared to today's stuff. But it was a great tool for spending a day in, and keeping dry.
I had a good size van for touring in then, though.

I found this thread, of a somewhat similar incident, in Co. Waterford in Ireland.
Two died, one survived. But that was going down a weir, and they seem to have got trapped in the undertow at the bottom.
http://forum.iww.ie/viewtopic.php?t=563
Seems a lot more dangerous than I remember it.

[JacksSmirkingRevenge]

They were obviously the victims of moonshine-crazed swampbillies, à la Deliverence...

[macdoc]

banjos what done it....

[rainbow]

Must a been aliens....

At last a sensible posting.

[mistermack]

I hate mysteries like this one. As they didn't even go down rough water, I can't come up with anything that would have done for all three of them.

The Irish guys in the thread that I linked to, I can understand. They were in more conventional kayaks with skirts to keep the water out. That's fine, so long as you stay in, and the skirt stays in place, but if you come out, or the skirt breaks away, you don't have much, or any, natural buoyancy.
Once they came out of the kayak, they had nothing but their lifejackets, which obviously weren't enough to save them in that weir.
But an inflatable, or even one of those sit-ons, is practically unsinkable. So long as you have something to hold on to, you should survive almost anything, unless you get snagged and held under. That's not likely to happen to all three.

If I was in a group of three, like they were, I would go down hazardous stuff one at a time. And carry mobile phones, so if one of you is in trouble, you do have a chance of getting help.