"Roger Houston" wrote in message
...
For whatever it's worth...

I spent years as a member of a Dive / Rescue team in an inland
recreational waterways enviroment.

We never recovered a drowning victim who'd been wearing flotation.

We used to say that we'd never recovered a body that wouldn't have been
alive if s/he'd been wearing a PFD, but then a carload of kids drive into
a partially frozen river. I don't think even PFDs would have helped them.

There are lots of ways to drown in white water while wearing a PFD. Anyone
who's been around white water long enough knows someone or at least knows of
someone who has drowned with a PFD on. Often it's because of being trapped
under water by the current (in a strainer, for example). The one person I
knew personally who died wasn't trapped under, though. It was just enough
repeated trips under in really rough water.

-Paul