hip belt/load handling security... was Re: [at-l] Crossing the Kennebec

[sloetoe@yahoo.com (Sloetoe)]

--- Jim and/or Ginny Owen <spiriteagle99@hotmail.com> wrote:
> Sloetoe <sloetoe@yahoo.com> wrote:
> >You can lose the pack (with a squeeze of a quick-release buckle)
> in a fall lots easier than you can recover lost stability *without*
> a hip belt *before* you fall. (And since we're on the subject...)
> 
> Toey -
> Those were the precise words that the man used as he stepped into
> Evolution Creek - less than 90 seconds before I had to pull him
> out.  His pack floated (remember buoyancy?) and when the water got
> deep enough it pulled his feet off the bottom.  When his feet came
off the bottom his face went in the water and his feet were flapping
somewhere in the middle - no traction, no support  --- and no air. 
He didn't find that quick release buckle - very few people do in that
situation.  It's hard to be looking for a buckle if your main concern
is that you can't breathe.

### OK, Jim, are we going to the "I-knew-a-guy-who-..." method of
science? Use yourself as an example, instead. If *you* found yourself
loosing stability in moving water -- a dunking on the immediate
horizon -- would you somehow forget yourself and fail to hold your
breath or pop your hipbelt as common sense? I doubt it. And the
gentleman in your example becomes a buffoon as soon as the
*possibility* of positive buoyancy and associated traction loss came
up. Are you suggesting that, if you found yourself face down in water
with a pack on your back, you yourself would fail to pop-n-roll?
(Careful, the FBI is monitoring all domestic email these days, and
will pay you a visit if your answer is... too convenient.)
### Anyway, recall, thank you, that were I to ford the Kennebec
to-to-todayyyy, I would be prepared to float my stuff across. (And
this from the guy whose father took a dusky picture of a teenage me
fly-casting in the Housy one April, ice showing on my guides, arms
held wide to keep 'em out of the swirling silty water.)
> 

> Is fording dangerous?  Absotively and Posilutely.  
### It's less dangerous than winter hiking, but somehow we've avoided
the paperwork and hoop-jumping except for Baxter, Ranier, Denali, and
such. With the thousands of 2,000 milers and sectioneers that have
passed the Kennebec/Caratunk ford without benefit of a boat, we have
one death in [roughly] 65 years. More are killed in Indiana youth
sports, but the only things that schools are banning is dodgeball
(and that has to do with political correctness, not physical hazard).


> If you're gonna do it then learn to do it right.
### As with everything, right? But I'm more likely to die in my
bathtub, and see nobody suggesting that bathing is unsafe, or that we
need lessons. (At the same time, most of us learn some sort of
bathroom/household safety from our parents... I have a "Parents" flip
calender at home that (once a year) quotes [maybe] Benjamin Spock
"Parenthood is the last great bastion of the amateur." But anyone
who's contested a child's legal custody knows that little aphorism's
obsolete. Step one for the defeat of America? Put someone else in
charge.) So maybe we need lessons on first on bathtub safety? Nah.
Hey! Let's get all of those damn knives out of American kitchens!!
They cut! They can kill! There's no child safety protection devices
on them! WHO ALLOWED THIS???
[rant over, almost]

> There's a ferry at the Kennebec now because someone either didn't
know how to do it right - or didn't believe it.
### Or maybe they could have died "doing it right" -- we don't know,
do we. Makes quite an impact, though, on whether one adjudges the
entire activity "prudent", "safe", or other such things. Were they to
have died "doing it right" -- then obviously the whole activity is
unsafe. But for those of us who've lost friends in automobiles (who
were, by all accounts, "doing it right"), what recourse do we have?
Heyyyyy, anybody want to talk about risk acceptance vis-a-vis
motorcycle safety? Do you know: if a motorcycle slows down enough, it
will fall over, ALL ON ITS OWN. [Major design flaw.] And GUNS!!!
DANG! But the battle to hold gun manufacturers liable for their
products' misuse FAILED in our courts! Oh! The Humanity! 
[alright, we're pretty far afield here. again. sorry. let me attempt
to rein in and get back on track.]

### Responsibility bites. 
> If you can't do it right - then DON'T DO IT.
### Amen. But that goes for lots more than fording a river with a
backpack.

Sloetoe
(apologizing to JimO righcheerenow for what may be a realllyyyyyy...
poorly written post)

=====
Spatior, Nitor, Nitor, In Nitor!

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