I found my carefully laminated map of the Five Islands off Port Kembla under the seat of the car a full day after it was needed. Holding the map in my hands I wondered if this one sheet of paper could have prevented what followed or was that putting too much significance into a simple representative two dimensional representation of reality?
Back in the days when I taught backcountry ski travel in avalanche terrain, I frequently exhorted my fellow travellers to “check the map.” The map allows you to recognise avalanche terrain before you enter it; a proposition far safer than continuing to ski blindly ahead until you are standing on a convex roll in the middle of a big avalanche slope under a hanging cornice with no safe exit point. With good map reading skills mysterious terrain becomes known, and known risks can be evaluated. That evaluation does not preclude knowingly entering risky terrain. The best backcountry skiing is in avalanche terrain, just as the best paddling is in wave washed locations, but risk should be evaluated as completely as possible before committing. Escape routes should be planned, and everyone in the group should enter the risky zone with the knowledge that they can cope with the worst possible consequences, not merely the best case scenario.
The most difficult risk to assess is the classic “low probability high consequence” event. Most of the time snow is stable and no avalanches occur, just as most waves are smaller and manageable, but every so often, a pocket of deeply unstable snow is encountered – unstable enough to rip the entire slope - or a wave twice as high as average rolls across a rocky reef. In those instances, it is not always possible to avoid high consequence events. Risk, of course, is also a function of capacity, and capacity, sadly (no matter what the language police propose) is a function of age. Older people have slower reflexes, less power, and can be catastrophically injured by minor events.Which does not mean that older people don’t get to continue taking risks. I’m over 60, I lead climb, I ride a mountain bike at speeds where I have only modest control, I paddle on the ocean through surf and swells. These are all good things, a life with no risk is no life at all.
When I lived in Nelson, BC, the heart of “champagne powder skiing,” a couple of times a season, I would take a group of women backcountry ski touring. The women were less gung-ho than my usual male companions and wanted to ski good powder with low risk. The trips were great fun, and, in truth, a nice break for me from continually skiing big slopes with the big boys with big consequences. But, there was a difference in how I approached those trips. I never expected the women to be able to either find me or dig me out in the event of an avalanche. I skied as if I was alone. Which means that I was as absolutely sure as you can be that the slopes we skied were safe.
What does all this mean and what does it have to do with the Five Islands and a lost map? Simply, it means if you plan to paddle a route, you and you alone are responsible for your actions and you must be willing to wear the consequences alone. I am more than willing, within the limits of my ability to stand by and attempt to render assistance if something goes awry; but if you commit, you should commit with the full knowledge that you and you alone are responsible for the consequences.
Below are a couple of images showing Red Point (on the mainland) and the Five Islands. This is the view you would get if you had a map! Or could even remember the map which you had glanced at the night before. A bigger island (handily called Big Island) separated from the mainland by two ocean gaps – one between a small rocky islet (also very handily called Rocky Islet) and Big Island and one between Rocky Islet and Red Point. The imagery indicates that, in most conditions, the most easterly gap, between Rocky Islet and Big Island has the deepest water. In fact, even in bigger conditions (the second image) there is a safe passage between Big Island and Rocky Islet. Depending on skill, a safe passage may also be effected through the gap between Rocky Islet and Red Point, but a cursory glance indicates this is the riskier option.
The nautical chart – a snippet of which is shown below – is less clear. Both passages are shown as having a similar water depth and both passages have bomboras marked. The eastern most passage, is a little bit wider and might be preferable as a kayaker can point straight into the prevailing swell, but the final assessment will need to be made on the water; the chart can only provide so much information. Our route is marked in red (it’s my track from my Garmin watch). The blue track indicates the route that was proposed as we bobbed in our kayaks a couple of hundred metres to the northwest of Rocky Island.
Why were we making this assessment from such a distance? I’m not completely sure! I was the last to launch and simply paddled out to meet up with the pod of paddlers at the intersection of the blue and red lines where they had been bobbing in the swell for some minutes. The reef between Rocky Islet and Red Point was breaking and, at times completely “closing out.” The passage, after all is less than 90 metres wide and has a bombora slap in the middle. Possibly the paddlers felt safer grouping up a fair distance from the reef rather than closer in where our viewpoint would have been better, but this may be splitting hairs.
Immediately upon my arrival at the “paddle pod,” one paddler proposed that we paddle the route of the blue line. We would, she told me, probably have to back paddle or hold our position while a few larger waves rolled over the reef to avoid being caught in breaking swells. Additionally, after crossing the line of breakers, we would have to turn and paddle beam on to the ocean swell for a distance before turning again and pointing into the ocean swell. However, I could be assured that where we would be beam on, the waves would be merely cresting not breaking and this particular paddlers risk assessment was that the proposed route was well within the parties capability and, additionally, this one paddler would take full responsibility for another member of the paddling party.
Now, I will admit that this seemed like a fine line to thread to me. Not impossible by any means and completely safe for some paddlers, but, I would hope that any paddler choosing this option would be able to react quickly, reflexively and with sufficient power to manage any breaking waves. Did this final sentence describe every paddler in our party? Not by a long shot, and that is not ageism, sexism or any other ism that the PC (politically correct) police care to throw about, that is simply reality.
I admit to being caught off guard. I was being pressured to make a decision immediately upon meeting up with the paddle pod and I had not had a chance to look at the proposed route for any length of time, and, I did not have that accursed map, which would have shown at a glance that a mere 500 metres to the north was another larger passage! I thought briefly about getting my mobile phone out, as I have both the topographic map and the nautical chart on my phone, but it was a bit bumpy to be messing about with delicate electronics. Why was my ageing brain unable to pull out of its depths an image of the map which I had quickly checked the previous night on my computer and why did I feel so pressured to make such a quick decision in the first place?
My decision was made in some haste and one of the most important lessons for me from this event is that I should, if possible, take more time to make decisions. In this instance, we were in a safe location, it was early in the morning, the weather and sea conditions were stable, and I could with ease and safety take a few minutes to evaluate all our options and make a considered decision. Which is not to say my decision would have changed, but I would – perhaps – have been able to communicate the reasons for my decision with more diplomacy. That is a perhaps because I am a very poor communicator! I can’t guarantee these are my exact words, but, it’s close enough “if we paddle that route every paddler needs to be able to put some power on if needed and I am not sure that describes our entire group.”
It’s probably obvious to everyone (anyone?) reading this that one paddler was very keen and one paddler was willing to follow the keen paddler anywhere but might not be able to pull out the required power and agility should things go pear shaped. The keen paddler said they would take full responsibility for the least strong member of our group. I had and have no problem with adults deciding on their own level of risk and acting accordingly. However, I also saw this as a potential low probability high consequence event (although I am not convinced the probability was actually that low) which is an instance where decisions should be made with the worst case rather than best case scenario in mind.
To say things got heated would be to say that the sun can be warm in the middle of summer, an understatement. I said I was not willing to accept that level of risk for one member of the party, but I was completely happy for the two paddlers to go through as long as they were cognisant that, as they paddled through the gap, they were responsible for themselves. I assured them that I would do my very best to effect a rescue should that be required but I could make no guarantees that a rescue would be possible or completely timely.
Things got heated. I felt a great deal of pressure to accede to the keen paddlers plan. I did at one point say “I will not be bullied.” A statement that is likely too strong for the circumstances. But, there is history here and history is hard to forget even if one has long since forgiven. It seemed to me, and I could be completely wrong about this, that the keen paddler was willing to take responsibility for the other paddler as long as I was also involved but not really willing to take responsibility if only two paddlers were to proceed. The antithesis of “skin in the game,” and, to throw in another incredibly overused metaphor, the rubber meets the road when skin is in the game.
The one sensible paddler in all of this had, while discussions were ongoing, simply paddled north, noted the wide open channel between Rocky Islet and Big Island and as we regrouped preparatory to paddling around the island from the north shared with us the information that she had been watching the eastern most passage for a period of time and no waves had broken through there. It was a completely risk free route, just some bumpy water and current, and we paddled through with ease! How foolish were we to debate a course of action when we had not even made the most cursory examination of all our available options.
What can be learnt from this long, long story with too few photos and possibly no point at all:
Everyone should have a map. Had anyone else in the party had a map none of this would have happened. With only one map in the party when that map got lost, we had zero maps!
Assess all options before making a decision. If that means paddling 300 or 500 metres, paddle 300 or 500 metres.
I understand completely the desire to do something, heck, I am one of the most goal oriented people around, but if you are damned and determined to do something, you might have to go alone.
If you are unwilling to go alone or with only one other person, you don’t have skin in the game. Take responsibility for that.
This lesson is particularly for me: take your time, make a considered decision and do your best to communicate that decision rationally and carefully.
Agree on the rules of engagement ahead of time. Most outdoor parties have an unspoken rule that any single member has veto if risk is deemed significant. It is likely better to make this clear ahead of time, particularly if you suspect that some members of your party do not operate under the same assumption.
I understand chafing against risk assessments. I have done so my entire life, particularly when I was backcountry skiing with the women. I never took those women anywhere near an avalanche slope and yet, sometimes one woman or another would decide that the slope we were planning to ski was unsafe. I might explain the risk again – perhaps in a different way with different words - but it is absolutely not my job to push anyone to do something they perceive as risky to life and limb. We all make mistakes and, if your mistake breaks someone you live with those consequences forever. Most of the things we do in life are simply not worth that.
No comments:
Post a Comment