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Paddleboarders in trouble in English Bay

Hm, they left from Jericho? 30 in total? Philip, was this a guided group?
 
odd police comment:
"Unfortunately, this group thought there was safety in numbers"

there is safety in numbers - especially here - as there was a lot to be seen and if any one in dire straits, some could have helped each other, and each one of them had a great big huge floatation device that was readily mountable by even several of them at once:

huge safety in numbers.
 
30 set out, 13 made it to the other side leaving/abandoning 17 to be rescued.
Safety in numbers?? NO!
There's nothing in the report to indicate that the SUPers were helping each other.
How many of those people would have set out to do the trip solo?

And, I do believe that a group of kayakers might have been better equipped to help each other.
How many SUPers carry tow gear? How do you tow a SUP?
 
AM said:
Hm, they left from Jericho? 30 in total? Philip, was this a guided group?
Click to expand...

At the moment, I don't know. My company doesn't run SUP classes/tours out of Jericho. I may be able to get more beta when I'm at JSA today.
 
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Thanks, Philip. No, I knew it wasn’t you guys, but with 30 boards in a group, I assumed it was the other outfitter.

Crossing English Bay is inadvisable for most paddlers. Wind and current make it a problem for novices and deep sea traffic makes it a hazard for everyone.

Cheers,
Andrew
 
Here we go:

6093522D-E596-4B38-8D67-B3FB31429901.jpeg
6093522D-E596-4B38-8D67-B3FB31429901.jpeg
 
What was the calamity? Any swimming? Any taken to hospital for hypo? Any loss of SUPs, paddles, gear, sunglasses, dignity?

or just blown off course or more importantly in the forbidden "unsafe" zone? was that the 'danger'?
 
Mick raises good questions. None of the news stories give any evidence that the paddleboarders needed or wanted rescuing. The stories only quote the Vancouver Police Department's press release. Was this really a rescue of seventeen vessels in distress, or was this in reality the world's politest law enforcement interdiction to exclude human-powered vessels from the Traffic Control Zone?

I can well imagine VPD might prefer a headline that says, "Police rescue seventeen paddleboarders in English Bay" instead of a headline that says, "Police detain and remove seventeen paddleboaders in English Bay."

I am open to being wrong, that this really was a life-saving operation, not the cops hassling innocent paddlers (or perhaps not-so-innocent paddlers). Anyone in Vancouver with on-the-ground insight into this incident?

Alex
 
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On the date/time in question the current flooding into the inner harbour under the Lions Gate would have been in the ballpark of 4 knots. Novice SUPers caught in that current would have been sucked into the Narrows which, on a holiday Monday, were likely teeming with powerboats, working tugs, and maybe the odd deep-sea tanker. Not a good scene.

I know there can be a tendency to dramatize/sensationalize these outdoor incidents, but in this case I really do think that having 17 “speed bumps” floating under the Lions Gate would have been a cause for concern. If someone had been hurt/killed, we can be sure that the hand of government would have squeezed the paddling community even tighter than it is with the current restrictions.

Cheers,
Andrew
 
Yah, even though I said it, I'm not really making the point about them being flushed into an awkward place and that they shouldn't have been removed and that it's more political/safety rather than danger/safety from the police point of view.

I'm making the more finer point that a group of 17 SUPs are more easily seen, more easily self rescuing, more readily rescued than 17 single SUP incident in the same place in the same conditions would be. ie I'm saying a group is far far more safe and has more options going for it than the same number of incidents as the members of the group spread out over single individuals.

even on the visibility scale one big bump of 17 will be far easier to see and react to than 1 small speed bump on 17 random days under similar conditions.
 
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