Every Spring and Summer, people drown on low-head dams. It's one thing
to accidentally end up in a low-head dam, but to do so intentionally is
madness and to do so without wearing a PFD is a death wish. Hopefully,
someone who has pondered running a low-head dam will learn from this
tragic mistake. Don't do it!
----------------------------------------------------

SEATTLE POST-INTELLIGENCER
http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/local/..._Over_Dam.html

Tuesday, June 6, 2006 · Last updated 6:13 a.m. PT
Kayak goes over dam in Tri-Cities, man missing and presumed dead

THE ASSOCIATED PRESS

KENNEWICK, Wash. -- Two men in a kayak went over a dam on the Yakima
River between Richland and Kennewick, and one was missing and presumed
drowned, Benton County sheriff's deputies said.

Gary Dean Kirk, 46, of Kennewick, reportedly surfaced a couple of times
about 30 feet downstream from the Wanawish Dam, also known as Horn
Rapids Dam, along State Route 240 before a witness lost sight of him
Saturday afternoon, witnesses said.

Cody Lee Hughes, 20, of Kennewick, who had been with Kirk in the
two-person kayak, was rescued after swimming toward shore through the
rapid current and clinging clung to a snag near a maple tree in about
four feet of water about 30 feet into the river, according to a news
release issued by sheriff's Capt. Charles Kissler.

As of Monday evening no trace of Kirk had been found in a search using
ground parties, personal watercraft, inflatable boats and a sheriff's
airplane, deputies said. More aerial searching is planned, Cpl. Brian
White said.

Kirk's 19-year-old daughter Janelle was being comforted by friends at
home, while his 18-year-old son Aaron joined in the search.

Signs posted along the river warn boaters to stay out of the area, and
the kayak contained life jackets but neither Hughes nor Kirk was
wearing one, White said.

"The information that I received from (Hughes) was that (Kirk) said he
had gone over the dam before, so they were trying to go over the dam
intentionally without wearing life jackets," he said.

Lowhead dams like the Wanawish can be deceptively dangerous because
boats and other objects that go over the drop can be caught in currents
that force them under water, said Scott Pattison, a spokesman for
Columbia Basin Dive Rescue.

Kirk and Hughes were swept beyond the boil line but were pitched out of
the kayak in the turbulence, he said.

---

Information from: Tri-City Herald, http://www.tri-cityherald.com

Bobo wrote:
Every Spring and Summer, people drown on low-head dams. It's one thing
to accidentally end up in a low-head dam, but to do so intentionally is
madness and to do so without wearing a PFD is a death wish.

Even WITH a PFD, the recirculation and the aeration in a low-head dam
tailwater can easily drown you. They aren't called "drowning machines"
for nothing.

Dive-Rescue International has a training course about low-head dam
rescue. The bottom line is that it's a very low-probability rescue.
They show some helicopter rescue, a fire-ladder rescue, and, most
soberingly, an attempt by some public safety officials in a boat at the
site of a boating accident attempting to recover what they thought was a
swimmer but which turned out to be an unused PFD from the earlier
incident. I think one guy survived, by hanging on to the lower unit of
the overturned would-be rescue boat. We watched people die on that
video, and it was a very disturbing sight.

If you have lines off both shorelines you can ease an inflatable
"Zodiac" boat into the tailwaters. Another expedient is to take a large
line off a fire truck, inflate it with air from a SCUBA or a
firefighter's SCBA device, and push the inflated hose across the surface
to a swimmer -- but that swimmer would have to be awfully lucky, awfully
strong, and have a stationary snag to hold onto while you got the rescue
together.

"Bobo" wrote in message
oups.com...
Every Spring and Summer, people drown on low-head dams. It's one thing
to accidentally end up in a low-head dam, but to do so intentionally is
madness and to do so without wearing a PFD is a death wish. Hopefully,
someone who has pondered running a low-head dam will learn from this
tragic mistake. Don't do it!
----------------------------------------------------

Uh oh......the hair on my neck is standing up.

--riverman
SAY it ain't so....

Pardon my ignorance -- I'm new to paddesports -- but what's a
"low-head" dam?

"leftylisa" wrote:

Pardon my ignorance -- I'm new to paddesports -- but what's a
"low-head" dam?

Otherwise known as a weir. It's a structure built all the way across a
river to control upstream levels (often to feed water into a diversion canal
for irrigation). The water flows over the top of the structure. If the
downstream side is uniform (as they typically are unless the person who
designed it was particularly smart), the hydraulic created by the water
flowing over it is incredibly uniform, and often very powerful. Unifrom
means there are no tongues crossing the hydraulic which can pull people or
boats out. To make things worse, they often have concrete walls at each
side, making it impossible for anyone stuck in it to get out at the edges.
Rescuing someone from a powerful low head dam can be very dangerous--many
rescuers have lost their lives over the years.

For pictures of one, look at
http://members.aol.com/RivierRatt/Trash/TrashUG.html This one, as the
author's disclaimer says, requires Class V skills to get out of. But it
does have a way out. Many do not--no matter how good you are, either in a
boat or as a swimmer.

-Paul

leftylisa wrote:
: Pardon my ignorance -- I'm new to paddesports -- but what's a
: "low-head" dam?

http://www.chicagopaddling.org/dam.html

--
John Nelson
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------
Chicago Area Paddling/Fishing Page
http://www.chicagopaddling.org http://www.chicagofishing.org
(A Non-Commercial Web Site: No Sponsors, No Paid Ads and Nothing to Sell)

Thanks to Paul & John for answering my question ... and everyone else
for sharing their info & stories. Y'all taught me something today!

I have no actual knowledge of the situation beyond what has been posted, but
a couple of things caught my eye:

First was they had supposedly successfully gone over the dam before.
Secondly, the article said they "were swept beyond the boil line but were
pitched out of the kayak in the turbulence".

Not to diminish the danger of low head dams in general, but it sounds to me
like this particular dam (at least at this water level) may not be of the
really lethal variety. It sounds like they got through what should be the
really dangerous part of the dam and came out of their boat just after due
to "turbulence" (white water?).

In a typical low head situation, PFDs won't save you--they'll just make it
easier to find your body (assuming it stays on). In this case, it sounds
like PFDs would have saved lives.

Can anyone who actually has seen this dam clarify the reports?

-Paul

Paul Skoczylas wrote:

In a typical low head situation, PFDs won't save you--they'll just make it
easier to find your body (assuming it stays on). In this case, it sounds
like PFDs would have saved lives.

If a PFD provides enough flotation, wouldn't it be able to keep your head
above the water? I was surprised once that with drysuit, thick fleece,
and an Extrasport Hi-Float, I was able to breathe while trapped in a hole.
I would have stayed in the hole if not for a throwbag, but I could breathe.

Bill Tuthill wrote:
Paul Skoczylas wrote:
In a typical low head situation, PFDs won't save you--they'll just
make it easier to find your body (assuming it stays on). In this case,
it sounds like PFDs would have saved lives.

If a PFD provides enough flotation, wouldn't it be able to keep your head
above the water? I was surprised once that with drysuit, thick fleece,
and an Extrasport Hi-Float, I was able to breathe while trapped in a
hole.
I would have stayed in the hole if not for a throwbag, but I could
breathe.


I think it depends on a couple of things:
My experience with weirs is that if the water is too aireated, you
simply float just below the surface, due to lack of buoyancy. Also, if
the hydrolic below the weir is too strong, you get pulled below, despite
a PFD and wet-/dry-suit. You might come up every once in a while, but
since you stay under for quite a bit of time in between and since we
lack gills, that eventually means that you run out of air in between the
pop-ups.
:-(

A couple of years ago I had difficulties rescuing a friend of ours who
was getting recirculated, I remember that I was amazed at how long she
stayed under during each circulation, despite wearing a PFD.

--
Wilko van den Bergh wilkoa t)dse(d o tnl
Eindhoven The Netherlands Europe
---Look at the possibilities, don't worry about the limitations.---
http://kayaker.nl/