And i'm sorry for your loss.


I am an ACA swiftwater safety instructor, and tho i don't claim to be a safety guru or even a safety nazi, river safety is something i'm interested in and i try to learn as much as i can can about it whenever possible.

Thank you for bring this incident up for discussion, i know it can be painful bringing up traumatic events like that from the passed, and i really appreciate your willingness to do this for the greater good of educating fellow boaters.

I have been noticing this rather disturbing trend lately ... people blowing rolls on harder runs. If he had rolled up on the first try, it's quite possible that he would have lived to tell about it. We'll never know, but at least he would have had a fighting chance.  ... having said that, it's also possible that he could have hit his head when he flipped and never had a chance to roll.

I've been keeping an eye on whitewater deaths, a large number of them involve people swimming into strainers or washing into them upside down.  ... far too many people have died this way.

So PLEASE people, drill your rolls until you come up the first time, every time.

And not just class V boaters either, this could have easily happened on class III