Izogi i may have got the MSC river thing wrong i just went to the MSC site for river crossings and was unable to find the waist belt thing,they say you can use the pack as a floatation device that could be where i went wrong.
What happend was i started walking across the river feet about shoulder width apart and boots on the left foot sliped on a rock and the left leg buckled and the force of the water knocked me over.I think i was lucky as the pack was faceing down stream and i was faceing up stream i sat into the water and the pack went up with the waist belt done up that would not have happend.
If i had missed the exit point i think i may have had trouble getting the shoulder straps off,i dont wont to think about it, i had nightmares for a week after it
Lindsay
Swum many rivers deliberately with my pack on and a couple of occasions accidentally - the Taramakau and the Raikia all done with pack firmly done up on shoulders and waist. This has worked excellently in both swimming and losing footing scenarios.
Always figured the last thing I wanted was the situation described above where the pack rises up over my head. Where I want the pack and it's buoyancy is at waist level so it keeps my head above water, so I secure it there, and generally have my sleeping bag near the bottom with all its trapped air.
Izogi i went to your post on trailspace and you are 100% right packs do float as long as you have a pack liner as mine floated very well nothing worse than haveing a wet sleeping bag
slightly off topic but If I know Im in for a swim on the trip I will use a drybag instead of liner. It works well.
On a trip down the Otaki a couple of years ago we were confronted with one crossing where the current was against a rock buttress which you had to work your way to the end of and let the current take you round the end of it. Most people disappeared about 5 meters after letting go only to bob up 5 seconds later 10 meters down the river.
I don't seem to be getting much acknowledgement over there. Oh well.
Yes, packs generally float as they have trapped air (mine didn't so it didn't!).
MSC say to leave your waist belt done up as I have laboriously explained above.
After a prolonged pack float: When you get to water shallow enough where you can stand up, you slip one shoulder off and let the current take the pack downstream of you. Then you slip the other shoulder strap off and drag your pack and walk to the shore. I think this is if your pack is so water-logged that standing would be difficult.
One time on a river safety course we had a very slightly built young Japanese man. He was so small, he looked like a girl. The course participants were told to carry quite a bit of heavyish gear e.g. a sleeping bag to mimic what you would have in your pack on a trip, in a packliner which they were to seal by twisting tightly and then tucking down the tail to keep it sealed. Well, the young fella didn't understand all this.
Unbeknown to us, he turned up with 2 sleeping bags in his pack and no packliner. I was paired with him for a challenging crossing and his tiny legs soon failed in the strong current and deep water so we began to packfloat. His pack filled up with water, including both sleeping bags and he had no flotation so we lay in the shallows waiting to be rescued as his pack was so heavy, he couldn't stand up and there was no way I was going to let him go because he couldn't swim. What a bloody disaster and a good lesson for me.
I earnestly recommend EVERYONE to do a river crossing course. Our tramping club really pushes the envelope and you discover the boundary of your abilities in increasingly deeper and swifter water. Because you are joined up MSC mutual support style in a group of 4 or 5, you are bomb-proof though I haven't tested this in a rapid with treacherous holes which is a scenario that you should avoid by not attempting to cross.
We are told no-one has died in a mutual support method. The formal MSC method locks you in fairly well to your mates. You can escape but you won't need to as you are in the optimum situation. I imagine if there were strainers (submerged logs and the like) it wouldn't be so good but that's another situation when you don't cross the river at this location at all.
Frank and I usually don't link up MSC style but if it's serious, we sure as hell do. On the odd occasion we have castigated ourselves for not linking up in their style when we have underestimated the depth and current.
Blue closed cell foam scraps everywhere! Yes, I've noticed that too. I'm a thermorest kind of girl, myself.
Hi Honora. Thanks for the comments.
I'm not sure if their claim about no mutual support deaths is correct, at least any more. When I read it I thought I could remember at least one case in the last few years. Some quick googling showed up this one.
http://tvnz.co.nz/view/page/536641/1585214
I don't know the exact circumstances or what went wrong, but it reads as if they were attempting a mutual support thing and the chap fell off the end. Probably they weren't doing it "properly" but then in some respects I don't suppose anyone could ever die doing it properly short of an unlikely meteorite strike.
For all the things I like about it, one of the biggest risks I think I've seen with mutual support is inconsistent training or ideas between people from the beginning, especially when people don't realise they're thinking different things until they're half way across.
Yes, that's why it's such a good idea to do the courses as they teach the same things whether it's a club course, an MSC course or a SAR course.
I've been on some club trips in a club where they don't do the training and witnessed all sorts of tomfoolery such as people wanting to hold my hand (!), line up using a stick or dragging little ladies across way too fast until they fall over and nearly submerge their cameras. I noted the smart lady on this trip kept well away from these clowns and did her own crossings at sensible points, using her 2 walking poles. And I'm talking about long-standing committee members getting up to these shenanigans.
Yes, I did a course through the club back in early 2007 which I found very valuable. It's probably time for a refresher when I have an opportunity, though I'm stuck away from the outdoors for a while at the moment.
They do teach the same things MSC-wide, but I've had the impression that the MSC changes and adjusts its recommended methods every few years, and the "right" way can sometimes depend on when a person's learned.
The weirdest experience I've had was when we ended up walking out someone from another club and he hooked onto the end of our line. Rather than lock his arms in between backs & packs as everyone else was doing, he went straight for grabbing front of my hip-belt and the clip promptly came undone. I'm not sure what method he had in mind.
