"Franklin" wrote in message
...

14 y.o. beginners, open tandem canoe, no immersion clothing, paddling
open
58-60 degree water, on a day with high off-shore winds forecast. It
takes
a very kind heart to find "reasonable" in that, and I appreciate your
trying, but it's hard for me to do so.

Why weren't you there? Sounds like criminal negligence to me. Please
post
your address and daytime phone number.

Wolfgang

I've been following this discussion for a couple of days, and I really
wish
I could understand where you're coming from with this line of thought.
From
your response above and the one you made to Brian, I get the impression
that
you think anyone who believes this was a preventable tragedy is just being
stupid. Am I correct? Why are you taking shots at these people?? Or are
you saying that anyone who wasn't there should be silent? I don't buy
that
either. Personally, I would rather debate all the issues associated with
a
fatality and possibly learn (or teach) something that would maybe prevent
something similar from happening in the future, than not say anything and
tacitly accept the deaths of kids like this as just being part of the
game.

I'll let Wolfgang take care of himself in your address to him, Franklin, but
I want to mention that at this point, with what I know from looking at the
guide's website, the schools website and the news reports (which as an
amalgam are still probably less than half the story), combined with my own
experience of leading trips, my feeling is that this was probably not
negligence, but a bad situation that turned out worse. I don't think anyone
who believes it was a preventable tragedy is being stupid, but I think they
are reaching the worst possible conclusion, and doing it very hastily. The
only evidence I can see that someone could say illustrated negligence is
that two kids died, there was only a cell phone for land communication, and
lots of suppositions about the events. However, there is ample evidence that
it was an artifact of some bad luck, and that the trip was well-thought out
and equipped. Specifically:

-the guide was experienced, had 25 years professional guiding experience and
the experience of running his own company with dozens of trips per year for
this same school. That's much more than most trip leaders have in any given
situation.
-the guide was well-acquainted with the kids, being their HS English
teacher, and having worked in that school with those kids for several years.
-the ratio of guides to kids is advertised to always be at least 1:8, which
is a very safety-minded and reasonable ratio.
-the ratio of boats was 6 client boats to 1 motorized guide boat. This is
_extremely_ reasonable, in my experience.

Additionally, it appears that the guide made the judgement call to stick to
their schedule, which would have assisted anyone seeking them in knowing
where they were. I don't know if the trip did not have a radio: at one point
when all the other members of the trip were safely at the pontoon, the guide
decided to send his strongest paddlers to search/rescue the other boys. That
it was himself indicates to me that there was probably an additional trip
leader. The only misjudgement I can put my finger on (which is not
criminally negligent, but a calculated risk) was that he separated the trip.
However, I probably would have done the same thing, and its entirely likely
that, if he had NOT done so, he would not have gotten into cell phone range
and the story would have read about an entire trip lost, not just two boys.

If there was not a radio, then that does not seem bizarre to me: in 15 years
of running trips, we almost never had radios. Even in the Grand Canyon,
commerical trips used to have a policy of using signal mirrors and sending a
runner. Many modern trips elect to not carry radios OR cell phones, as that
can alter the experience we've had threads about that here). I think its
very resonable to not assume that all trips must carry radios. Remember,
this was primarily a coastal cruise, with what looks like one open water
crossing to that night's campsite. Even the local enforcement folks made
mention that this one particular stretch of water had the unusual
characteristic of being shallow enough to make ocean waves steep-sided. It
sounds like if they had been a handful of miles farther along, the situation
would have been entirely different.

Anyway, at this point I think that assuming that it was negligence is a
judgement based on the thinnest of information, and is being based solely on
the outcome. Hindsight is always 20/20, but having been in enough situation
that have gone sour, I know that you can never prepare for ALL
possibilities, and from facts I can glean, it looks to me that this guide
and company had established enough protocols to indicate that they probably
were not negligent, but just caught in a small series of misfortunes and
reasonable misjudgements. One litmus test for negligence is to ask yourself,
if you were in that situation, at what point would you have made a different
decision. From what it appears happened, that moment (if they did not have a
radio, which we don't know) would have been to decide not to cross the open
water. But when the set out, the weather was clear and optomistic, so I
probably would not have done differently. The other time would have been
right when the canoeists started getting blown away (if thats what
happened), and if the motor had started, then it would have been trivial to
catch them.

What would you have done differently?

--riverman



If Steve's description of the circumstances is correct, I have to agree
with
him- the guide, however qualified he might be, appears to have made an
error
which resulted in the death of these children. It's one thing to take
risks, and I would agree that to live life insulated from risk is not a
good
thing. But the risks I take in my life are ones that I assume for myself.
Fourteen year old beginners like this are not in a position to assume risk
on their own, they are at the mercy of the people who lead them. And it
sure looks to me like these kids were led wrong. I seriously doubt that
in
the last moments of their lives they were thinking thoughts like "well, I
took a risk and now I'm going to die, but I leave this life happy, knowing
I
lived life to the fullest!" They were probably terrified because they
never
dreamed that a simple paddle on the water could end up killing them.
Unless
I'm really missing something, these kids were depending on the guide to
impart to them the risks they were assuming and to protect them, and he
let
them down.

To be honest, I wasn't really bothered by this event when I read the
initial
post, but your responses in the vein above have convinced me that there
*was* negligence.