I had a near miss on Saturday.  I am sharing this long-post for two reasons: one, hearing about experiences both good and bad is what I believe makes this board, and the community it serves, invaluable; and two, I hope that the exercise of writing this may help me process the experience.

The hard thing for me to believe is that it didn’t happen on some run that was at the upper end of my ability or on a move that required difficult paddling.  I ended up getting caught in a hole on the Middle Middle right above House Rocks.  I have been boating for 6 years and have probably run this stretch 100+ times.  I don’t often run it at the level it was at on Saturday (3400), but it was not a level that I really had much concerns about and was paddling with confidence up to that point. 

I was following my friends Jay and Mark as we approached the entry boulder of House Rocks from river right.  I watched Jay finish the first half, and then Mark.  They had both gone to the left of a hole in the center.  I wasn’t really thinking much of the hole.  I was in my Pyranha Burn and it seems to handle meatier holes well.  I actually still don’t remember going over the lip and what went wrong, but I do vividly recall suddenly side-surfing a fairly deep and violent hole.  I knew I was in for a bit of a ride, though not panicking.  I rolled after a short bit and while I was upside down, I stretched out and tried to grab the current beneath with my paddle.  I felt the water go calm and so thinking I was free I rolled up only to find myself being pulled back in and again side-surfing.  Despite the chaos, I remember still being calm enough to get some deep breaths knowing I would likely be swimming.  The next time I rolled over, I went for the loop.

I don’t recall this, but according to Jay, my boat came free and I surfaced and broke free from that hole.  However, to my terrible misfortune, I immediately swam into another hole below it.  Jay will have to chime in, but I believe he said I was down for maybe 20 seconds.  It seemed like an eternity for me.  I don’t know if I got much of a breath in that moment between, but I was exhausted after exiting the boat and really short of breath.  I was stuck deep enough in the hole so even when I surfaced at the bottom of it I was swallowing a lot of water and not getting any meaningful breaths.  I wasn’t panicking too much at first; I was confident I would get free shortly.  But I was stuck in a horrible re-circulating pattern.  Each time I was pulled back to the depth of the hole, I became shorter and shorter on breath and kept swallowing more and more water.  I was fighting it, trying hard to swim at the right moments, only to get thrown back in.

The last re-circulation was the point in time that is still very fresh in my memory.  I didn’t get a breath as I was pulled back in, but I desperately needed one.  I was lower in the water than the previous cycles and couldn’t get my head to the surface, but could feel myself still being held.  I am having problems describing the exact feelings from that moment, maybe panic, maybe disbelief, but I do remember having three very distinct and rapid thoughts:   one, I was drowning; two, I remembered hearing that drowning ends up being peaceful once you stop fighting (and I had almost no fight left); and three, I felt very bad for my family and friends having to deal with me drowning on them.

I can only speculate why, but right after that, I broke free and surfaced.  According to Jay I surfaced in the current down a bit from the hole.  I had no energy left at that point.  Mark and Jay had immediately known I was in trouble and were paddling up to me.  I was exhausted and actually don’t remember if I swam or grabbed one of their boats to get to shore, but it was thankfully a very short swim to shore from when I surfaced.  I collapsed on the bank for a few seconds and then just sat there coughing up water.  Jay went on to get my gear once he determined I was going to be ok.  The rest was your routine swim drill.  Jay did a wonderful job running down and successfully getting my boat and paddle and Mark wouldn’t leave me as I stumbled along the river bank.

I was probably in some form of shock or denial about what had just happened until I got home and sat down next to my wife.  On the drive home I had planned on just giving her a matter of fact account of the incident and what I was going to say; she is very patient and supportive of me and deserves to know about the close call.  But when I actually sat down next to her on the couch to give my pre-rehearsed account, I couldn’t get more than 2 words out of my mouth before I just lost it for the next couple of minutes.  I felt even worse seeing how scared I made her.  I spent the rest of the day in a fog.  We went to a 4 year olds birthday party, then a family dinner, then to see a friend’s band play.  But the whole rest of the day was surreal to me.

My wife and I have talked more about it today.  I have thought about it for too many hours as well; replaying the incident over and over and trying to gain some perspective about what happened.   I could probably write a few more pages about what I have been thinking since Saturday morning. 

I wasn’t sure about posting this at first.  I could have just as well done this exercise in an email to a few friends.  I also thought that if everyone wrote about getting worked on the Middle Middle or the Sky, we’d soon be deluged with posts.  But while I have had my fair share of swims and thrashings in the past, I have never come close to the despair I felt yesterday.  In sober (when I sobered) hindsight, I can say with certainty it was a close call.  So, maybe the intended purpose of this post is to offer a reminder that this sport we love is filled with more random dangers than most others.  An “average” day on an “average” stretch of a river has the potential to be anything but.

Hey Scott, glad you're safe and sound and you had such good padlling partners! Here are a couple of thoughts about this situation:

Thanks Chip and Mike.