Canoe capsize training with childreen

[ingo]

In winter time my canoe club has booked the university swimming pool for several capsize trainings. I took my wooden canoe and both of my daughters to join it and practise a little.

Capsizing is easy :)

http://www.datenbank-bildungsmedien.de/ingo/p11.jpg

But not so to get the water out of the boat

http://www.datenbank-bildungsmedien.de/ingo/p12.jpg

Since it is a wooden canoe, it does not sink even with childreen on board

http://www.datenbank-bildungsmedien.de/ingo/p13.jpg

Some minutes later

http://www.datenbank-bildungsmedien.de/ingo/p14.jpg

http://www.datenbank-bildungsmedien.de/ingo/p4.jpg

[ingo]

Okay, now the crew

http://www.datenbank-bildungsmedien.de/ingo/p7.jpg

http://www.datenbank-bildungsmedien.de/ingo/p9.jpg

http://www.datenbank-bildungsmedien.de/ingo/p10.jpg

[ingo]

Another training: two canoes

http://www.datenbank-bildungsmedien.de/ingo/p16.jpg

http://www.datenbank-bildungsmedien.de/ingo/p17.jpg

http://www.datenbank-bildungsmedien.de/ingo/p18.jpg

http://www.datenbank-bildungsmedien.de/ingo/p19.jpg

[ingo]

Experiences:

* It is _much_ easier to handle a wooden canoe than the plastic one
* In calm water it shoud be feasible to get on board again
* Childreen can help to get the water out ;-)
* Hopefully we will never come in this situation in cold and rough water

[Brian Palmer]

Ingo,

Looks like fun. My boys will be doing the same at the pool this winter with their new kayak.

Google "capistrano flip" and try it the next time you are at the pool. It really works. My sister-in-law and I did it with a 75 lb aluminum canoe and we're both wimps.

--Brian

[ingo]

Yes, we tried it, too. (And I have an arcticle about it from 1964 at www.datenbank-bildungsmedien.de/ingo/capistrano.pdf (http://www.datenbank-bildungsmedien.de/ingo/capistrano.pdf)) But it did not work well. Maybe a lack of training, there was the same ammount of water inside than before...

[George Roberts]

Tomorrow the test is cold water, 4' chop, 20 knot wind, and no shore.

We drop you off. You paddle home.

[JimD]

Could be the whole family is planning a move to Panama?

[ingo]

No one is missing by now :D

[hokiefan]

A few years ago I did that for real. I went canoeing in the Ogeechee river near Savannah with a buddy of mine. Both of us were reasonably proficient paddlers and had learned to dry a swamped canoe as kids in the Boy Scouts. It was a beautiful September day and there was a church group up ahead of us on the river, making a ton of noise, but apparently having fun.

Around one bend we heard a scream, a splash, then howling laughter. Rounded the corner to see two women hanging on a downed tree with there stuff (canoe, cooler, packs, flipflops, etc) floating down the river. The other four canoes in the group were chasing the stuff, what were they thinking. Well, we stopped and picked up the ladies and delivered them downstream to the sandbar where the rest of the group stopped.

Then we heard another splash as one of the guys was trying to get back upstream to rescue a cooler and dumped. So off we go to get him. Upon delivering him to the sandbar, we wished them well and took off down the river.

A little later we pulled off and stopped for lunch in a little patch of sun on one bank. As we finished we heard them approaching and decided maybe it was best if we let them go and followed them down the river. Besides, their passing was good fun to watch.

After giving them a good headstart (we wanted at least 30 minutes of quiet) we took off. Most of the river we paddled was a winding, narrow river, with overhanging trees. The last 2+ miles widens considerably to say 3/4 of a mile wide with marsh on both sides. When we got fully into the wide stretch we were only about 100 yards behind. A kid in one boat stood up and tried to splash someone in a neighboring boat and fell in. He grabbed the gunnel of the 2nd boat, tipping it over. One of its occupants then grabbed the 1st boat on their way in, tipping it as well. So there were two swamped boats, four swimmers in the water with no PFD's on, and one complete non-swimmer (with PFD) who had somehow scrambled back in a swamped boat; all about 5-600 yards from anything resembling a shore, which was in fact 50-100 yards of marsh.

When we got to the swamped boats, they told us everyone was accounted for and fine, but they had no clue how to empty the canoes. We told them to swim over and hang on the other canoes in the group and we would take care of the swamped boats. It took a little convincing to get the near panicked non-swimmer to get in another boat, but their preacher helped out there. Then Burton and I started talking through what we had to do, since neither of us had done it in several years, and we hadn't done it together. At that point one of the swimmers started giving "advice" and questioning if we knew what to do. I'm fairly patient, but finally Burton had it and told him, "If you were so d*** smart, you wouldn't be swimming right now!" With that he shut up and swam off to hand on another canoe.

After talking it through, drying the swamped canoes went smoothly, and we got them all loaded up. Given the events of the day we decided to stay with them to their landing another 1/2 mile or so down river, then go on our way. Safely at their landing, they all thanked us for the help and wished us a good day.

At the time, the whole thing seemed pretty funny and never really seemed very threatening. The weather was good, the water was warm, and there were no injuries to deal with. Looking back, those folks were in quite a pickle given the location and the fact that they could hardly paddle the boat, much less rescue their buddies. Its kind of scary to think of the bad decisions they could have made in the hours they would have probably had people in the water if there was no one to help them. I could see the other three canoes dumped when they tried to load the 5 swimmers in the three canoes.

Glad we could help. I'm also glad for the little experience and training we did have that allowed us to be able to provide competent help.

Ingo,
Hopefully your kids will never need to use what you've taught them, but they will be much safer paddlers for learning it. Good on the club for providing the opportunity and good on you for taking it for the kids.

Cheers,

Bobby

[kc8pql]

Ingo, Google "capistrano flip" and try it the next time you are at the pool. It really works. My sister-in-law and I did it with a 75 lb aluminum canoe and we're both wimps.

We taught this method at a YMCA summer camp back in the '60's. With a little practice a pair of 12 year olds wearing life jackets could learn to flip a 17' alu. canoe in flat water.

[Tom Hunter]

Bobby,

People (but not Ingo's people) drown in the circumstances you describe. You and your buddy did a really good thing.

[Canoez]

Ingo - excellent experience for your children, your wife and you. It may save your life some day. I have had the experience of doing canoe rescue in 4' swells on Lake George (32mi long, 1 mile wide lake) in New York state. Training is excellent.

Aside: I didn't know that they made wooden submarines in Kiel :D

[redbopeep]

Yes, we tried it, too. (And I have an arcticle about it from 1964 at www.datenbank-bildungsmedien.de/ingo/capistrano.pdf (http://www.datenbank-bildungsmedien.de/ingo/capistrano.pdf)) But it did not work well. Maybe a lack of training, there was the same ammount of water inside than before...

The photo of the author, above that article reminds me of my ocean canoing with my husband.

A (long!) story--

My husband's family has a long history of tripping in canoes--one of his dad's favorite memories is of being 8 years old (1933) and taking a 51 day canoe trip through the part of Ontario, Canada which is now the Quetico Provincial Park (a huge and wonderful preserve that one can only access by non-motorized boat). You can canoe for weeks without crossing the same lakes/rivers and seeing very few people even today. My husband grew up canoing in the Quetico every summer for 2-3 weeks. When we were college students together, we helped his dad organize canoe trips through Indiana University's Continuing Ed program. We'd teach the attendees basic strokes and technique during an intensive weekend program. There were always people who didn't "get it" and while canoing down the winding rivers of southern Indiana, we'd have an experienced team in a canoe in front of the group and one behind--to pick up the paddles and things floating ahead and to help people get back into their canoes if they spilled.

We'd teach them how to back-ferry across bends so that they would never be "broadside" to the river current and risk being swept under the brush and trees in strainers, but most paddlers loved the speed of whipping around those bends in the river and couldn't be bothered to do it with control. There was usually a strainer or two that could have been deadly but somehow it always worked out, thank goodness.

My favorite wilderness canoe trip was in late April-early May 1982. We spent 2 weeks in the semi-frozen waters of the Quetico doing a trip known as "Hunter's Island" circling the entire provincial park All the rivers were in spring flood stage; we had 2 canoes and 5 people, a great trip allowing one person to rest at all times. We even saw a moose giving birth on an island in the middle of a big lake--we paddled by at dawn--amazing. We also saw the remains of another not so lucky moose who was eaten by wolves on one of the portages. Yuck...I digress...now...about that ocean canoing...

We moved to San Diego California in 1984 and off-on all during the mid-late '80's we'd take our canoe down on Baja and canoe out through the surf then going along the shore, exploring--always surfing our way back in to shore. We already owned a canoe and couldn''t afford a sea kayak, so we canoed in the ocean...

We also spent 2 to 3 weeks almost every January camping on the beaches of mainland Mexico between Mazatlan and Zihuatanejo. While camping, we'd do the same paddle out and surf back routine. Usually in wetsuits because of the cold Pacific ocean, we'd take our snorkeling/diving gear with us and do some underwater exploring, too. The canoe was always attached to one of us with a long painter since we worried that we'd lose it and have to swim miles back to where we'd started.

Sometimes, canoing to an island or a snorkeling spot a mile or two...or five...offshore, bobbing down below the swells that were much bigger than we were in our little canoe, I'd wonder if we were crazy to be doing this in an open canoe...but then, the dolphins would swim alongside us in such an encouraging way...we'd make it back through the exciting surf, rooster tail flying from the stern as we came in and I'd think--no, we're not crazy, we'd be crazy NOT to be enjoying our canoe in the ocean. Back then, we were the only car in San Diego with a canoe always on top. Everyone else had their surfboards. And, we still couldn't afford a sea kayak so we kept having our fun in our own way!

We only swamped once in the ocean--we were exploring a rocky cliff/shoreline looking at seals and sea lions in caves and a series of huge waves came in as we were within a canoe's length of a sheer rock face. As the water level suddenly dropped about 10 feet we looked behind us as a wall of water gathered in a horrifying way. We backpaddled like mad (thank goodness for all the white water back-ferry experience) up the face of the gathering wave and as it crashed down we barely were able to keep the "out to open water" momentum going. Two more huge waves crashed upon us as we madly backpaddled away from shore. A safe distance out beyond the breakers, freezing in the February Pacific ocean off the Baja coast, with water just about up to the gunwales, we nixed bailing and jumped out to do the Capistrano flip. Oh, so cold, and NO wetsuit that day, only thin polypro longjohns over our swim suits as we hadn't planned on leaving the canoe and we'd gotten a little cocky about our ability to stay dry through the surf. I was upset with both of us for taking such risks (close to the rocks/caves and without proper wetsuits in place) and while scrambling back into the boat, I recall declaring to hubby that this was the LAST time we'd be doing this "canoe through the surf and explore thing." But, back in the boat and a mile's paddle and a lovely run in through the surf, I was again thinking "oh, what a great way to enjoy the ocean in a canoe!" and saying to hubby "let's do this again, next weekend..." :p

P.S. We use a canoe as a tender/dingy for our sailboat now. Some things don't change. Although, I'm not so nimble and able to jump out of the canoe when bringing it in to shore these days I still love the flexibility, load capacity, and speed of using a canoe.

[JamesCaird]

Hi Guys-Good work and thanks for the info.
Back when I was a kid in the Boy Scouts we did the canoe flip and recover as training every year. Now, as a parent and an uncle with a place on a fairly good sized lake, I get the nieces and nephews and any other kids together any good day and have them do rollover and righting and bailing. All this so they know how far they can go -stability-wise, and demonstrates that life does not necessarily end if you find yourself in the water alongside the boat. It is all good training and fun and demystifies the canoe/kayak world. Makes them better boatmen, too.
Work for us! Cheers/JC

[Rational Root]

It's kinda scary just how unprepared people can be. Depending on the assistance of whoever may just happen to come along does not sound like a good exit plan.

Let's hope they learned a little from the experience.

D


So there were two swamped boats, four swimmers in the water with no PFD's on, and one complete non-swimmer (with PFD)

<snip>

At the time, the whole thing seemed pretty funny and never really seemed very threatening. The weather was good, the water was warm, and there were no injuries to deal with. Looking back, those folks were in quite a pickle given the location and the fact that they could hardly paddle the boat, much less rescue their buddies. Its kind of scary to think of the bad decisions they could have made in the hours they would have probably had people in the water if there was no one to help them. I could see the other three canoes dumped when they tried to load the 5 swimmers in the three canoes.