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| Safety The Loss of a Novice Text by Charles A.Sutherland Map by Martha Brouwer  On Saturday, May 26, 2001 , 51-year-old Robert Beauvais participated in a sea-kayaking course for beginning paddlers—a six-hour class listed as Essential Skills I, run by a New England–based kayak school. The participants included four students and Carla, a British Canoe Union (BCU)–trained (Four Star) instructor. (Names of the staff and other students have been changed.) Paul, an unpaid volunteer, helped with instruction during the morning session. Class started at about 10:15 A.M. The kayak school provided boats and equipment for the students, including a wetsuit, spray skirt, paddling jacket and PFD for Robert, 5' 11" and of average build. The day was partly sunny with a light southeast wind at approximately five knots, which strengthened later in the day. The air temperature was 75˚F, and water temperature was about 58˚F. The water in the area was well protected from the southeast wind and waves. The initial instruction was carried out on shore. Instructor Carla showed the students how to get in and out of their boats and how to get the spray skirts on and off the cockpit rims of their boats. Under her direction, the students each went through this exercise twice on shore before launching. Carla asked the students if they understood the maneuver and confirmed that they all felt comfortable with their ability to perform it. She told the students they would do wet-exit training in the water at the end of the day, as she didn’t want them to start the session by getting wet and risk having them become hypothermic during the course of the outing. Before launching, the students also were instructed on how to hold the paddle, perform various paddling strokes and do a deep-water rescue. They launched their boats at about 10:45 A.M. Once on the water, Carla taught forward, reverse and turning strokes. Shortly after launching, while working on a forward sweep stroke, Leslie, one of the students, capsized. Initially, she tried to struggle to the surface while still in the boat but then remembered she had to first remove her spray skirt from the rim of the cockpit. As she reported later, her first attempt to get it off failed, and in spite of the wetsuit she was wearing, the cold water made her want to gasp for air. She continued to hold her breath and made a second effort to free the spray skirt. Simply pulling on the grab loop failed to remove it from the cockpit rim, but she remembered to punch it forward and up. The skirt came free of the cockpit rim, and Leslie bailed out successfully. She estimated that it took her about five seconds to get out of the kayak. Carla then pulled Leslie’s boat across her own boat to dump out the water (a T-X rescue) and helped her reenter it from the water. Carla used the capsize as an opportunity to review the wet-exit procedure and to demonstrate a deep-water rescue. The students continued working on strokes, and Carla spoke about other marine subjects while they paddled south along the shore. George, Mary and Leslie stayed up front with Carla, while Robert moved a bit slower in the company of the assistant, Paul. About noon , Paul headed back to the launch site. Carla kept the group together, and they usually stayed within 10 or 15 yards of each other. They crossed the boating channel to have lunch on a small island. During the lunch break ashore, Carla assisted Robert in adjusting the position of his foot braces. They launched again at about 12:45 and paddled around to the lee side of the island to work on more paddling skills. These included the draw stroke and more paddling forward and backward. The students also worked on paddle bracing. They were to lean to one side until starting to fall, then recover by slapping the surface of the water with the paddle blade in the low brace -position. To avoid the wind, Carla lined the students up near shore for more practice doing the low brace, but the wind carried the group about 100 yards away from shore as they practiced. Leslie’s boat was parallel to Robert’s and about 25 feet to his left. At about 1:45 P.M. , Robert capsized toward Leslie while trying to practice the low brace. According to Leslie, “when he tipped, he almost immediately began splashing the water on his left side facing me. He was flailing his arms, and I think he was trying to yell for help.” Carla started paddling toward him noting that Robert hadn’t exited the kayak. George called out that Robert wasn’t getting out of his boat. Carla paddled to the right side of Robert’s boat and reached across it to pull him upright. Robert clutched at Carla and tried to pull himself up. She noticed that Robert’s hips were apparently outside of the cockpit, but his spray skirt was still attached to the rim of the cockpit coaming. |