Scoutmaster vs. Mother Nature

"If someone in your raft goes into the water, they are your #1 priority." That made sense at the time. It turns out, the safety talk you receive before going onto a Class III river is packed of important information but entirely devoid of nuance. My commitment to take the guides entirely at their word in this matter was going to cost me.

In other matters, it would serve me well, however. Before you get in the water, they teach you some important actions you can take to keep your boat upright. If your raft is going to hit a rock, you need to "love the rock;" that is, you need to move to the side of the raft that will make contact with the rock. It may seem counter-intuitive, but if you lean away from the rock, the side that makes contact becomes light. As the water hits the rock, it responds by pushing up. When upward pressure of raft meets light side of raft, passengers are soon introduced to swimming.

"Whatever you do, don't stand up!" The worst thing that can happen to you in a river is foot entrapment. This happens when a foot becomes caught in an obstacle, preventing the person from floating down stream. The pressure of the current tends to force the person face down into the water. Drowning is the usual outcome of foot entrapment.

"If you do fall out of the raft, grab hold of the purple strap on the side of your boat." Presumably, the raft is going out of the rapids. If you're in the water, out of the rapids is definitely where you want to be. Also, holding on to the strap means you're close to help.

After the safety lecture, we were instructed to pick up our boats, carry them to the water, and get onto the river. RH, AH, JT, WG, and I stood up. AH and JT lifted the raft by the strap on their side, RH, WG, and I went for the strap on our side--but there was no strap. Alright, whatever; we lifted the boat up over our heads and walked down the trail.

It was a delightful day. The weather was warm enough, although a few degree more would have been nice. We approached the first rapid.

SPLASH

AH is in the water. JT grabs him, yanks him back in (JT is about three times the size of AH), and we're on our merry way. It was a good time to emphasize to everyone the importance of tucking your feet into the sides to help keep you in the raft.

Most of the trip was uneventful. It took a little while for me to figure out the movement of the raft with this group (it's always different depending on how strong the paddlers are and where they are placed in the boat), and so we went through some of the rapids backward. I actually enjoy doing the Class II rapids backward, even though the guides always yell at me about that.



At long last, we reach a rapid called Double Hydraulic. Unlike most of the other rapids, it doesn't have a creative name. Also unlike most of the other rapids, going in here can be really really bad (as opposed to just irritating and inconvenient). If you look at the above map of the rapid, you'll see that you enter the rapid from the left side and make a left turn before hitting the two hydraulics. It is recommended that you don't hit the rock at the entry point, but it isn't a big problem if you do so long as you keep your raft upright.

The water moves fast though, and as we approached the entry, it became clear to me that we were going to hit our left side on the rock. I jumped to the left side of the raft, joining JT and AH. RH and WG didn't join us. The left side of the raft lifted, RH and WG fell backward into the water, and AH was sort of catapulted over RH's head into the water. JT and I managed to hang on.

My mind started racing. Get them out of the water. As quickly as I could I stowed my paddle, crouched up in the middle of the raft, and looked for someone I might be able to reach. I found all three of the now-swimmers on the left side of the raft, and watched as RH disappeared into the first hydraulic. I started to move to try and get to a position where I could reach him when he came back up. I didn't think far enough ahead about the consequences of the raft hitting the hydraulic that had just swallowed RH and found myself in a cool, wet, and unfriendly to breathing environment. When my head resurfaced, I didn't have enough time to look for the boat before I saw the white wall marking the second hydraulic. Close my mouth, close my eyes, please don't hit a rock.

In case you're wondering, it's a lot quieter in the wall of water than it is in the last second before you go in. I was lucky enough to not hit any rocks going through. Very shortly after coming up, another raft was at my aid and pulled me in. I began to look around for the other rafters. I look upstream. There's JT in the raft finally making his way out. How the....whatever, he's fine. Soon, I found WG, and I caught a glimpse of AH. But where's RH. I started freaking out. Where's RH? Where's RH? Of course, no one is answering me. I keep looking back up to the rapid. Did he come out?

In retrospect, I realized that I was in shock. If I had taken a minute to calm down, I would have realized that RH was ahead of the raft in the water. He would have come out first, and would be down stream of me. Sure enough, he was three rafts down. As soon as I saw him, sanity returned.

I can't say as much for one unnamed passenger in the raft. He responded by going into a much heavier form of shock than I had. We took five minutes to try and warm him up and bring him back into his right mind. But for a while, he was insistent that he didn't want to continue. Fortunately, once he fought off the shock, he was back to his usual cheerful self and anxious to hit the next rapid.

RH was very kind, and chose to blame the outfitter for letting us take a raft that didn't have a strap on one side. When he went down, he had tried to grab the strap, which would have saved us a lot of trouble. But I do appreciate RH trying to place the blame elsewhere.

Initially, I tried to avoid taking the blame myself. In the end, however, I have to face it; I never gave the order to move to the left side when we hit the rock at the entrance. That one simple command would have kept the boat from tipping, kept RH and WG in the boat, and RH probably would have been able to keep AH from going in at that point. I wouldn't have gone in if I wasn't looking to rescue the swimmers.

End score in this round of Scoutmaster vs. Mother Nature:

Mother Nature, +1
Scoutmaster, -4 (one for each lost rafter)

My apologies to those I lost. I'm glad you're okay and I won't blame you if you never get into a raft with me again.



Tip for future rafters:
1) Inspect your raft before you leave. If it isn't properly equipped, request a different raft.

2) Give every order possible. It's better to be annoying and micromanaging than to go through what we just went through.