Posted by: MartinFocazio
40 Bucks in equipment, 30 Yards away, 2 Prob. Dead - 01/03/04 04:17 AM
Sort of on-topic.
See: http://www.phillyburbs.com/pb-dyn/news/113-01012004-220218.html
and
http://www.phillyburbs.com/pb-dyn/news/113-01022004-220534.html
We get a dispatch out of our coverage area to assist another station about noon Wednesday (New Year's Eve) - Marine Rescue, Lake Nockamixon. Along with our fire & rescue company, I hear about 8 other marine rescue companies dispatched to the same location. On arival, we have several helos in the air, boats launching into the 1400 acre lake and I find out we're looking for two hispanic men, missing at least 24 hours.
That morning, our Fire dept captain (who works at the state park where the lake is) saw their Coleman RAM-X 15 Canoe capsized and washed up on the shore and called for S&R.
My boat is assigned shoreline search, we head out and cover about 2 miles of shoreline and turn up nothing - no paddles, no seat cushions, no life vests. Meanwhile, another boat locates a duck blind and some duck decoys in the water about 30 yards off shore. On the ground near the blind are several dead ducks, entrails from some of the ducks, shotguns and some other items. So now we have a location where they were, and we move our primary search to the area around the duck decoys, while continuing shoreline search, and adding land search crews. I work a boat with underwarer cameras and also shuttle divers & equipment out to the search location. Darkness comes, command calls us in, we've found nothing. We re-group in the morning on New Year's day and now there's even more searchers. We have dive teams from Philadelphia (40 miles to the south) and Allentown (40 miles to the north). We have many dog teams, we have over two dozen divers, underwater cameras, a helicopter, a hovercraft and many, many marine rescue boats. There's news crews on the shore and in the air, we're running low on gas and diesel, and still, nothing. Finally, in the afternoon, a marine unit finds a dry-bag washed up on shore about a mile from where the boat was found, it's got some clothes in it. The dogs make a positive ID and they bring the bag in to command.
The divers are searching in zero visibility, the water is between 37 and 40 degrees, and ranges in depth from 2 feet to 45 feet in the search area. I leave at 2:30 PM, the search continues on the water until sunset, and some dog teams work through the night. Today (Friday) we took a day off, but we're going out again tomorrow.
Now, we DO know that it was their first time in a Canoe, and we know that they have never hunted from a Canoe before.
The rest of this is all speculation, but the scenario we're seeing is:
One of them went out in the canoe to collect decoys. Falls in. Either panics, gets cold, or sinks. Friend sees what happened, goes to swim in to help - it's "only" 30 yards out. Perhaps they both went out. Family members claim they were "good swimmers" and perhaps they thought they were, but 3 minutes in 37 degree water, probobly with a heavy coat & boots on, nobody's swimming 30 yards.
And yet - yet - with a $20 K-mart life vest just about anyone could have made it to shore under those conditions - maybe cold, maybe some hypothemia, but alive. $20 to save a life. I just can't imagine going out on a winter day, over water, without at least a PFD. Hell, I was wearing a full-body immersion suit just for the shoreline search. Amazing, really.
They are going back to the lake in the morning, I don't know if they will call us in again, maybe they will.
Just letting off some steam here.
See: http://www.phillyburbs.com/pb-dyn/news/113-01012004-220218.html
and
http://www.phillyburbs.com/pb-dyn/news/113-01022004-220534.html
We get a dispatch out of our coverage area to assist another station about noon Wednesday (New Year's Eve) - Marine Rescue, Lake Nockamixon. Along with our fire & rescue company, I hear about 8 other marine rescue companies dispatched to the same location. On arival, we have several helos in the air, boats launching into the 1400 acre lake and I find out we're looking for two hispanic men, missing at least 24 hours.
That morning, our Fire dept captain (who works at the state park where the lake is) saw their Coleman RAM-X 15 Canoe capsized and washed up on the shore and called for S&R.
My boat is assigned shoreline search, we head out and cover about 2 miles of shoreline and turn up nothing - no paddles, no seat cushions, no life vests. Meanwhile, another boat locates a duck blind and some duck decoys in the water about 30 yards off shore. On the ground near the blind are several dead ducks, entrails from some of the ducks, shotguns and some other items. So now we have a location where they were, and we move our primary search to the area around the duck decoys, while continuing shoreline search, and adding land search crews. I work a boat with underwarer cameras and also shuttle divers & equipment out to the search location. Darkness comes, command calls us in, we've found nothing. We re-group in the morning on New Year's day and now there's even more searchers. We have dive teams from Philadelphia (40 miles to the south) and Allentown (40 miles to the north). We have many dog teams, we have over two dozen divers, underwater cameras, a helicopter, a hovercraft and many, many marine rescue boats. There's news crews on the shore and in the air, we're running low on gas and diesel, and still, nothing. Finally, in the afternoon, a marine unit finds a dry-bag washed up on shore about a mile from where the boat was found, it's got some clothes in it. The dogs make a positive ID and they bring the bag in to command.
The divers are searching in zero visibility, the water is between 37 and 40 degrees, and ranges in depth from 2 feet to 45 feet in the search area. I leave at 2:30 PM, the search continues on the water until sunset, and some dog teams work through the night. Today (Friday) we took a day off, but we're going out again tomorrow.
Now, we DO know that it was their first time in a Canoe, and we know that they have never hunted from a Canoe before.
The rest of this is all speculation, but the scenario we're seeing is:
One of them went out in the canoe to collect decoys. Falls in. Either panics, gets cold, or sinks. Friend sees what happened, goes to swim in to help - it's "only" 30 yards out. Perhaps they both went out. Family members claim they were "good swimmers" and perhaps they thought they were, but 3 minutes in 37 degree water, probobly with a heavy coat & boots on, nobody's swimming 30 yards.
And yet - yet - with a $20 K-mart life vest just about anyone could have made it to shore under those conditions - maybe cold, maybe some hypothemia, but alive. $20 to save a life. I just can't imagine going out on a winter day, over water, without at least a PFD. Hell, I was wearing a full-body immersion suit just for the shoreline search. Amazing, really.
They are going back to the lake in the morning, I don't know if they will call us in again, maybe they will.
Just letting off some steam here.