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North East Rowing on-line
NEW YEAR SAFETY RESOLUTIONS by John Mulholland

Among the resolutions we all make, and break, each year, can I suggest a few  that may keep you with us so that you can make similar resolutions for 2007.  I refer, of course, to safety precautions when rowing.
Capsize
Swimming in our local rivers feels cold most of the year, but is dangerously so in winter.  A good rule of thumb is that, without a lifejacket or flotation device, you will survive for about two minutes per degree of water temperature.  With our local waters at one degree, you have about two minutes to get your torso (surrounding your heart and lungs) out of the water.  Your best bet is either to re-board your boat if you can; try it at your next capsize drill.  If you can’t re-board, and most novices and veterans can’t, pull yourself onto the upturned shell of your boat and await rescue.  Attempting to swim cools your core temperature dangerously.  
Stay afloat, get on your boat!
This brings home two other considerations; is your boat sufficiently buoyant to keep you afloat and who is going to rescue you?  
Buoyancy
Unless severely damaged, or poorly maintained, any single or double will be sufficiently buoyant because the bow and stern compartments are large compared with the weight of the crew.  Fours and eights are likely to be adequately buoyant if they have sealed compartments under each seat (like Janousec and new Lola/Aylings).  If the crew compartment is of an open construction, either wooden lattice or unsealed compartments, the boat is unlikely to float adequately when swamped.  Boats can be swamped by waves coming over the side (usually on open water e.g. the Tyne at Newburn, Talkin Tarn, the Tweed at Berwick or the Tees at Stockton) or by the hull being holed by underwater damage or by a really big crab.  In most cases a buoyant boat can be rowed to safety with the crew’s torsos well clear of the water.  A non-buoyant boat will require urgent rescue by outsiders, e.g. a suitable safety boat with capacity for the whole crew of four to nine members.
I’ve put a short paragraph on boat selection below.
Rescue
Rescue can be from the bank on narrow rivers, e.g. the Wear at Durham or by a safety boat.  Even a small safety boat can rescue a crew reasonably quickly by ferrying the crew to the bank, but an eight some distance from a bank on which a landing can be made is at far greater risk.  Singles can be rescued by other singles using the buddy technique.  There are some stills of the technique on the NERN web-site and I will put a video clip on the site as soon as I’ve figured out how.  Please practice the technique in a pool during capsize drills before relying on it for real.  With practice, it is easy; in a panic it may not be.
Sort out your rescue plan before you boat.
Audible Warning of Impending Collision
I know that coaches of the Durham colleges have been asked not to coach loudly with megaphones in the early hours, but some people are taking it too far.  If you see a crew approaching you on a collision course, shout a warning!  It doesn’t matter too much what you say; the sudden sound just in front of the other crew, combined with the natural panic in your voice, will convey the message.  The word “AHEAD” is the conventional cry, combined with the boat type if known, e.g. “AHEAD EIGHT!”  If you are not sure if you are on collision course it is better to shout and miss than not to shout and have a painful collision.
If in doubt, shout!
Ambient Conditions
If you are not sure about the conditions, don’t go out.  If you don’t know the river, or tarn, ask someone who does know it.  Novices should not make their own judgements as to whether to go out, and juniors MUST NOT.  For a very good guide on hypothermia and the affects of cold, follow this link:
http://www.leoblockley.org.uk/cold-water-safety.asp
If in doubt, don’t go out.
Navigation
There are navigation rules on all our local waterways, with some local rules to cope with narrow bridges and other obstructions.  In general the rule is KEEP RIGHT so that you pass stroke-side to stroke-side.  Do not assume that because you are an elite crew doing a training piece you can use the middle of the river; there may be another elite crew going in the other direction.  As in the Highway Code, do not stop on blind bends or in the middle of the river; consider other river users.  Coaching launches should obey the same rules as their crews while, in addition, minimising the effect of their wash on all other crews.
Navigation errors should be punished in training races (private races not in the ARA Calendar) by disqualification or time penalties, so that no advantage is gained by dangerous steering.  If you want to use the whole width of the river, you must get the agreement of all other clubs using that stretch, but remember that non-rowing traffic may still be using the river.
Look where you are going; if two crews collide, neither was keeping an adequate lookout and each was, therefore, partly to blame.  Remember the old epitaph on a sailor’s grave: “He was right, dead right, but just as dead as if he’d been wrong”.
Incident Reporting
This is not just for the benefit of officialdom.  If a pattern of incidents is developing, we can all look for ways to prevent those incidents.  Without incident reporting, we’ll never see that pattern.  We do not use these reports to assist in a witch-hunt.
Boat Selection (Fours and Eights)
When buying a new boat, please think carefully about your selection.  FISA has introduced new guidelines requiring a swamped boat to float with the crew seats no more than two inches below the water surface.  The ARA has requested boat builders to put a plate on the boat giving, among other things, the maximum crew weight that the boat will support (not all do so).  It is up to the purchaser of the boat to confirm with the supplier that the boat is adequately buoyant, and will meet the FISA guideline.  Your contract is with your supplier; and he should know the buoyancy of his boats.  The Control Commission at a regatta can not be expected to know the buoyancy of every boat just by looking at it.
If you buy a second-hand boat, you should consider the cost of making that boat comply with the FISA guidelines.  It may not be possible to get the accurate data from the manufacturer, either for very old boats or where the manufacturer has gone out of business.  As mentioned above, fours and eights are likely to be adequately buoyant if they have sealed compartments under each seat (like Janousec and new Lola/Aylings).  If the crew compartment is of an open construction, either wooden lattice or unsealed compartments, the boat is unlikely to float adequately when swamped.  Any boat can be made more buoyant by adding airbags under the slides; 20kgs per seat should suffice for a four and 40kgs per seat for an eight.  A better solution is to seal existing compartments or create sealed compartments; you get dry kit storage as a by-product.  I am also investigating other methods of adding buoyancy to boats (e.g. injecting expanding foam); if you have any suggestions, please let me know.

© 2006  North East Rowing On-line