Horrifying water moments
Oct. 15th, 2019 09:50 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
rebeccmeisterLast night, scrottie and I finished watching a sailing movie, Chasing Bubbles, about a white midwestern guy who decided to sail around the world in spite of having minimal sailing experience. Throughout, there were multiple stories of extremely close calls where different people almost died. The thing is, on the water, many close calls often come up extremely fast - so fast that there isn't time to react. I'm glad the film directors decided to keep those moments in there; life at sea can go from pleasant and benign to incredibly dangerous very quickly, and the people on this boat had zero backups: no rescue dinghy, no life jackets, nothing. Yet somehow, in spite of all that, Bubbles managed to make it all the way around the globe.
This morning was a gorgeous New England fall morning (disregarding that New York isn't technically New England). The water was flat, there was a big moon.
Our coach had us do a steady-state piece, which was nice after the intensity of the regatta this past Saturday*. I pushed off the dock in the 1x shortly after the first of two doubles, and rendezvoused with them at our usual gathering spot, at the far side of the river. Once a second double and a quad joined us, we got underway.
I was directly underneath the I-90 bridge when I heard an unusual sound: a motor that wasn't one of the vehicles whizzing by on the interstate way overhead. I turned and looked, and to my surprise and horror, saw an enormous ship bearing down on the bridge. Cue a sudden flashback to sand barges traveling through the Montlake Cut at oh-dark-thirty early in the morning. When a sand barge comes through, you Get Out Of The Way. Thankfully I was completely clear of it, but I could see that one of the doubles behind me hadn't seen it yet and was too close for comfort. They weren't on a direct collision course, but you still don't want to get too close to a large vessel under power if you can help it. "BIG BOAT!" was all I could scream.
They turned, saw the boat, and managed to get out of the way. All told, the wake and wash weren't as bad as they could have been. But still.
Last fall, someone had mentioned that there could be big boats out in the fall, during the leaf-peeping season, but I never saw anything of the sort last fall, so I'd gotten complacent. I guess that's what must have gone past. The boat had the look of a small sight-seeing cruise ship. Now I know. There are big Things that lurk in the night.
*I haven't blogged about the regatta because it was full of a bunch of moments but I'm not sure I have coherent things to say about it right now. Two things I can say: I'm glad I got in that singles race, and WOW we had an awesome row in the quad.
scrottie and I finished watching a sailing movie, Chasing Bubbles, about a white midwestern guy who decided to sail around the world in spite of having minimal sailing experience. Throughout, there were multiple stories of extremely close calls where different people almost died. The thing is, on the water, many close calls often come up extremely fast - so fast that there isn't time to react. I'm glad the film directors decided to keep those moments in there; life at sea can go from pleasant and benign to incredibly dangerous very quickly, and the people on this boat had zero backups: no rescue dinghy, no life jackets, nothing. Yet somehow, in spite of all that, Bubbles managed to make it all the way around the globe.This morning was a gorgeous New England fall morning (disregarding that New York isn't technically New England). The water was flat, there was a big moon.
Our coach had us do a steady-state piece, which was nice after the intensity of the regatta this past Saturday*. I pushed off the dock in the 1x shortly after the first of two doubles, and rendezvoused with them at our usual gathering spot, at the far side of the river. Once a second double and a quad joined us, we got underway.
I was directly underneath the I-90 bridge when I heard an unusual sound: a motor that wasn't one of the vehicles whizzing by on the interstate way overhead. I turned and looked, and to my surprise and horror, saw an enormous ship bearing down on the bridge. Cue a sudden flashback to sand barges traveling through the Montlake Cut at oh-dark-thirty early in the morning. When a sand barge comes through, you Get Out Of The Way. Thankfully I was completely clear of it, but I could see that one of the doubles behind me hadn't seen it yet and was too close for comfort. They weren't on a direct collision course, but you still don't want to get too close to a large vessel under power if you can help it. "BIG BOAT!" was all I could scream.
They turned, saw the boat, and managed to get out of the way. All told, the wake and wash weren't as bad as they could have been. But still.
Last fall, someone had mentioned that there could be big boats out in the fall, during the leaf-peeping season, but I never saw anything of the sort last fall, so I'd gotten complacent. I guess that's what must have gone past. The boat had the look of a small sight-seeing cruise ship. Now I know. There are big Things that lurk in the night.
*I haven't blogged about the regatta because it was full of a bunch of moments but I'm not sure I have coherent things to say about it right now. Two things I can say: I'm glad I got in that singles race, and WOW we had an awesome row in the quad.
no subject
Date: 2019-10-15 05:38 pm (UTC)Yeah, but did you win?? :)
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Date: 2019-10-15 06:49 pm (UTC)I definitely didn't win in the single. I was racing against a bunch of US National Team hopefuls who were all 15 years younger than me.
We got third in the quad, which was pretty darned good for us.
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Date: 2019-10-15 06:05 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2019-10-15 06:47 pm (UTC)A friend of mine who was a rowing coach went into diabetic shock, fell off his coaching launch, and drowned, in part because he wasn't wearing a PFD (and he used to insist that everybody else wear one).
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Date: 2019-10-15 07:52 pm (UTC)Everything I've done work-related is in pretty cold water, so there are multiple reasons for a PFD to be a good idea, just because of cold shock and the quick decrease in coordination. But the possibility of other accidents is always there--no one out for recreational fishing is planning to end up in the water, but if they do, how did they get there and are they in prime condition to swim after whatever happened? My dad mentioned they don't wear PFDs all the time when they go out on salmon fishing charters, except if they cross the bar and then just for that period their guide has them put them on. Personally, I'd wanted to argue "You are 70 years old, things might happen, wear one anyway" though I didn't actually say that to him. Just talked about cold water dangers.
I've used the inflatable vests on occasion, though I actually prefer a non-inflatable for reliability. I have noted that the Corps of Engineers (at least the district I work with) does not allow anyone to wear one until they have jumped into the river with one on so they know what it is like. And sometimes, even in those tests, they have failed, or been so delayed as to not be very helpful.
I can see rowing being challenging regarding PFD's because you don't want them in the way. But there is probably the difference that, I presume, you are constantly aware that you could end up in the water pretty easily, and so the other aspects of preparation as you have said are greater than for a recreational fisherman or such who may have no consideration of ending up in the water.