Four dead in Lake Superior

[Jammer]

The water is cold even in August.


Family took a kayak out on the lake and capsized. Mom rescued by a larger boat. Dad and 3 children dead of hypothermia



A light on a dark Lake Superior led to sole kayak survivor - StarTribune.com


Keep your radio on, you may save a life


Public service announcement: A PFD will not save you in cold water, get a wetsuit instead if you're going to canoe or kayak

[Navi2016]

That's very sad

[thinwater]

Originally Posted by Jammer

... Public service announcement: A PFD will not save you in cold water, get a wetsuit instead if you're going to canoe or kayak

Or a dry suit.


And make sure you can reboard in waves. Practice!

[Unity]

How dreadful. But maybe we can learn from their dreadful loss?

Besides appropriate thermal protection (wet suit) - pfd with strobe is clearly critical ... and cheap! How many of us have a strobe on all our PFDs?

But would a PLB or AIS SART have been more important? Due to the cold temp and therefore short time required for recovery seems like SART was the only viable answer and for them may have worked. But a PLB activates a “bigger net”, though slower for response.

Does anyone yet make a dual PLB and SART? That would make the most sense, no? I guess battery life and size becomes the problem.

We are preparing now for an offshore adventure and all PFDs (required to wear when top sides or bad weather) will have strobes and AIS SART ... but only the mothership / ditch bag will have the EPIRBs.

What do others do?

[john61ct]

Also go play out in warmer waters.

Tragic

[JohnHutchins]

Originally Posted by thinwater

Or a dry suit.


And make sure you can reboard in waves. Practice!

Yes, drysuit. A drysuit's insulating ability depends on what you have under it but survival times are many multiples of a wetsuit. In addition, drysuits are generally bright colors while wetsuits are so often black. Be bright.

Without a drysuit, attempting to swim will significantly reduce your survival time (with a drysuit swimming is much more often a good strategy) so have radios, cell phones, whistles. lights, and the like attached to your body at all times.

Stay together -- your survival time will be longer if multiple people lock arms facing each other in a huddle.

[newhaul]

Originally Posted by Unity

How dreadful. But maybe we can learn from their dreadful loss?

Besides appropriate thermal protection (wet suit) - pfd with strobe is clearly critical ... and cheap! How many of us have a strobe on all our PFDs?

But would a PLB or AIS SART have been more important? Due to the cold temp and therefore short time required for recovery seems like SART was the only viable answer and for them may have worked. But a PLB activates a “bigger net”, though slower for response.

Does anyone yet make a dual PLB and SART? That would make the most sense, no? I guess battery life and size becomes the problem.

We are preparing now for an offshore adventure and all PFDs (required to wear when top sides or bad weather) will have strobes and AIS SART ... but only the mothership / ditch bag will have the EPIRBs.

What do others do?

I wear my auto inflating off shore mustang any time the boat is off the dock. And clip in when leaving the cockpit.( regardless of weather) I have one rule stay on the boat . I singlehand so if I fall off the boat I die. It doesn't care and will just sail on. No epirb but if I had others onboard things would be different epirb would be required.

Sad that such a tragedy has to happen for these questions to be asked.

Every safety rule is written in blood.

[Mike OReilly]

What a tragedy. I can’t imagine the pain the mother and the rest of their family must be going through.

I lived on Lake Superior for something like 17 years. Canoed, kayaked and sailed most of it, including down in the Apostles where this event occurred (actually bought my current boat down there). This is very sad... but…

I don’t mean to dis the dead, but… what an idiotic decision to try and paddle that far, in those waters, with five! people in a "13 ½-foot, open-top tandem kayak”. I’m sorry, but that is just dumb.

I have kayaked major stretches of that Lake, and I would only venture out in a proper 18’ enclosed sea kayak. Even a well-found open canoe is the wrong boat for the open Lake. A 13 foot open kayak with five people aboard is a very poor choice indeed.

Every year people would die on the Lake. They mostly do it by failing to appreciate that this is not some little inland lake, but a true sea. Conditions can change very fast, and the water at all times of year is bitterly cold.

One year a couple of university students decided to paddle an open canoe to an island some 5 miles off shore. Their canoe washed up in front of my house, followed by the SAR teams. The body of one paddler washed up on the next beach over from mine.

This is a tragedy that should never have happened, and it’s made worse b/c it seems to have been self-inflicted.

[SV Bacchus]

So very sad. A poor decision was made the mother will live with the rest of her life..

[Jammer]

Originally Posted by Mike OReilly

I don’t mean to dis the dead, but… what an idiotic decision to try and paddle that far, in those waters, with five! people in a "13 ½-foot, open-top tandem kayak”. I’m sorry, but that is just dumb.

I have kayaked major stretches of that Lake, and I would only venture out in a proper 18’ enclosed sea kayak. Even a well-found open canoe is the wrong boat for the open Lake. A 13 foot open kayak with five people aboard is a very poor choice indeed.

Well, I would imagine that the boat was overloaded, and it was a poor choice for the lake.


There is an absence of clarity and nuance in how the MNDNR talks about paddling in the Apostle Islands. There are people who are generally comfortable in a family kayak but don't know its limitations. The MNDNR places great emphasis on boating sober and with a PFD. The family did that. People take kayaks around the islands pretty routinely (and along the shore), which is fine, as long as you have an escape plan if the weather turns.



The problem is crossing between islands. The DNR's position is more or less that you should just take a charter because you, the family boater, do not have a suitable craft or skills. And people disregard this because it sounds like a money grab for the charters and because it's obviously not true. Better if they say use a sea kayak, be skilled, no kids; or use a boat at least 24', twin motors or sail.


We've had two rescues near my house this year on the Cannon River. Previous years we've had none at all or the occasional flood related or drinking related accident. It's a little river that can't support more than a canoe or kayak over most of its length. But there's been a huge swell of interest in canoeing and kayaking on it, and so they get people with no skills and no judgement. One rescue was someone in a cheap inflatable that deflated in the middle of nowhere leaving the family stranded. The other was a woman who capsized, got caught on a strainer, broke her leg, and her companions couldn't get her off the strainer. I believe they were using an outfitter and couldn't swim.

[clockwork orange]

While a drysuit would be a good choice it is unrealistic to think that you are going to put drysuits on little kids. I doubt they even exist and if they did the cost would be prohibitive for something they will grow out of in a summer. I havn't followed this story but if indeed they were all in a 13ft sit on top kayak there's your problem. Very sad.

[belizesailor]

Originally Posted by thinwater

Or a dry suit.


And make sure you can reboard in waves. Practice!

Just returned from a kayaking trip. We practiced both assisted and unassisted recoveries. Both are physically demanding even in calm warm tropical waters...bad conditions and cold water would be a very difficult situation.

[belizesailor]

Originally Posted by Navi2016

That's very sad

Yes, like most boating accidents it was a series of bad decisions and totally avoidable. Very sad indeed.

[oleman]

We had a helo go down during a training exercise so west 150 miles off coast of Southern Ca in the early spring. Took us 45 minutes to get to the site and rescue the crew. Helo went down like a rock but the crew all were in good shape when we recovered them. EXCEPT they were all suffering from hypothermia. I have much more respect for the effects of a cold bath after that.

[getyourbone]

Originally Posted by belizesailor

Yes, like most boating accidents it was a series of bad decisions and totally avoidable. Very sad indeed.

Couldn’t agree more...

Usually one bad decision isn’t deadly but. Put a few together and the likelihood becomes far greater. Unfortunately the mom and dad own those mistakes/bad decisions.

My heart goes out to the family. I can sooo relate. My daughter I and ended up separated for awhile from mom/wife and considered the other dead. Luckily after about an hour, we ended up back together and eventually rescued 4 or 5 hours later.