Home Forums Fishing Freshwater Wading & drowning: avoiding latter while doing former

<br>On a recent evening I got swept off my feet in swift water while wading and fishing. Since we often learn the most from our mistakes, painful as they are to admit, I'll do a postmortem here looking for anything that might help the next guy.
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<br>I was fishing salmon from a gravel bar whose top was just awash some 75 yards from one side of a 350 yard wide channel. I'd waded out toward that nearer shore, casting and working toward a slot.
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<br>Water depth was just below the knee, so swift I decided not to go deeper. The lumpy surface looked like the river stayed shallow for another 20 yards downstream from me. Suddenly as I probed, my downstream foot felt the edge of a sharp drop-off. The sand and gravel mix crumbled away and in the space of one intake of breath I spun into deep, swift current, no contact with bottom. I was wearing my life jacket, fastened. That was partly due to not taking time to take off the vest before my first cast, and partly to a small intuition that wading alone out there I should keep the jacket on. I had not put on my waist belt to cinch the Gore-Tex chest waders but the life jacket belted the chest waders pretty tight.
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<br>An eddy lay downstream from the exposed bar. I held my rod with one hand and stroked across the current toward the eddy with the other, away from the closest shore. I wanted to get back to my boat, unaided. About 20 fishermen watched this along the main shore within 300 yards of me. The current swept me downstream over 60 yards while I swam across it for 7 yards to get into the eddy. Once in the calm eddy I made progress at first, though slower than I'd hoped, back toward my boat pulled up on the bar. A boat came by and hollered at me from about 40 yards away, asking if I was OK. I wanted him to come over and pull me to the bar but I was OK, making progress, and I replied "I think so." He went on upriver.
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<br>When I was about 20 yards from my boat, I quit making progress, soI held the rod with my legs and back stroked with both arms. (I had reeled in my line, sinker to tip of rod, when I'd reached the eddy). I still wasn't making progress and was being drawn toward the swift current that had swept me downstream. To hold my place I had to swim ever stronger across the eddy, away from the swift current rather than toward my boat.
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<br>About then a boat came up behind me and called to me to get in. I had quite a bit of water in waders by then, and though I could have swam for much longer, I could not pull myself over the high gunwale of his boat. I asked him to just idle over to the shallow water while I hung on. He thought I was dying and helped haul me into his boat. He said he had been watching and fired up his boat to come get me. He was sure he had saved my life and that I would never have made it. I thanked him deeply and genuinely, but believed I that I would have made it to the bar.
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<br>Not so once I stood on the bar and looked at where I'd been. From a higher eye level I could see a cross current in the eddy which had stopped my progress toward my boat, and would have soon pushed me into the main current and swept me downstream again. Had that happened, I would have eventually dropped the rod and struck out across current for the nearest shore some 75 yards away. I expect the current would have taken me a quarter mile downstream before I reached shore at the end of the island. If I missed that landfall, beyond it is wide, fast, open river.
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<br>However, I may not have been able to make it, tired after many minutes of swimming and my waders gradually filling. When I met the guy later at the boat launch, I thanked him more deeply for saving my life. He made a good decision while a lot of people watched. By the time it looked to them like I needed help I'd have needed it super fast.
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<br>So what did I learn? Next post.
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Sharp lessons I learned from my potential drowning: From now on I will wear a life jacket (or inflatable vest) when wading in such tricky situations, swift with unknown bottom and deep water downstream. Without floatation, I'd have probably drowned before anyone could have helped.
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<br>Second, a wading staff to probe the bottom would have spared me. I would have found and avoided the drop off. I thought I was pretty good at reading bottom from surface currents, but I totally missed that one, even when I went back to look at it later.
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<br>Third, wear and tighten the wading belt around chest waders, always.
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<br>Fourth, pay attention to intuitions that encourage safety, such as my inner inclination to wear the life jacket.
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<br>Fifth, experience in swift water keeps a person calm. I am comfortable in water, having canoed and done whitewater trainings, sea kayak rescues, surfing, diving in whitewater rivers, etc. Therefore when the current swept me off my feet into deep water, I was not alarmed. I was annoyed and slightly embarrassed because of my audience, but not frightened in any way. It was simply a problem to solve. I did not even consider swimming to the main shore because I knew the eddy was close, that I could reach it, and that it would help me get back to my boat without bothering anyone. Depending on that eddy to take me back upriver with no complexities in the current was a mistake however.
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<br>Swimming in a lifejacket in river or tidal current for play is good prep for such unplanned dunkings. The key, as with rip tides, is to not fight against a current because you waste strength in a fight that you can't win. Go where the current wants to take you, and either use that or at most edge across it to get out of it.
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<br>Sixth: ask for help. It was colossally foolish of me to decline or even hesitate to ask the first boat to help me. ( I will not comment on what the guy in the boat was thinking). Better to be a little embarrassed and get out while strong and barely wet, than to need rescuing bad or be dead a few minutes later if your self help plan does not work. In hindsight, I believe that the transition from being OK to being in imminent danger of death would have been very quick, probably a matter of seconds.
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<br>I was in the water quite awhile, between 12 and 15 minutes. My loose fitting waders took in enough water to fill the legs to mid calf, not full but heavy and sluggish to move. I did not get cold though the water is extremely cold. I had on plenty of clothes and was swimming hard. Cold would have come with time.
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<br>The boat rescuer seemed surprised when I handed him my rod first. I did not lose my rod, my cap nor sunglasses, and did not get my hair wet. I fished another 45 minutes from the same bar.
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Yikes, to us mere mortals it sounds like you almost died. It is always nice to learn a lesson at someone else's expense!!!!!! I am NOT letting my wife read that story or she won't ever let me go fishing by myself again!!

Wade, your comment about not letting your wife read that pokes a "that reminds me" button. A good friend and hunting partner had dropped our first Mt. goat, and we had roped down to where it was wedged on a narrow ledge between the only sapling (growing out of a crack) and the cliff wall. The top was 40 feet above us but the drop below was a clean thousand feet or so to the first bounce, 4000 to the river (that makes it a freshwater post, Rick) where we could see our vehicle parked where we'd left it two days before. We tied in before starting cutting, and I inched back with Jack's camera to take some pictures of him with goat and the magnificent view, river far below, peaks across the horizon. He told me not to take any pictures, that if his wife saw them she would never let him hunt such places again. I shot one of the best rolls of my life, and that turkey told me he lost the film.
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<br>By the way, it looks like a longer shot all the time for me to make the Sept. 21 gathering in Olympia. Now I have a wedding conflict I'd forgotten about, and pressures are mounting already due to a three week trip I start on the 24th. Sure would enjoy meeting everyone.

I''m glad you are still with us OK.
<br> I'd say it was a mistake to wade downstream. If you step into a hole, the bottom often gives way in the current. Guess how this old Ironhead Fisherman learned that !
<br> Not having your wader belt nice and snug was No.2.
<br> I much prefer non-inflating life vests for wading. They are fool proof, and don't require that one pull a cord to fire a CO2 cartriage.
<br> I like a wading staff alot. Gives you something to keep you in place as you reposition your feet.
<br> Thanks for the story. We all need to be reminded of old lessions once in a while. E