Surfski Knowledge Base

lori & beau whitehead
04/09/17 #21010

Friday afternoon I was stationed at one of the fire halls on the other side of town, when I heard a dispatch for a water rescue off of Fieldston Ave (Edgemore). A homeowner with a view of the water reported what he saw as a “paddleboarder in distress.” It turned-out what he saw was a paddleboarder fall off his board 2 times in about a half-mile. The time was 3:40 pm. The paddleboarder remounted both times and resumed what I can only imagine was a grand time given the wave size. This one call to 911 put a whole chain of events into play; 2 fire engines out of service looking from shore, the coast guard trying to scramble a boat that was on the other side of Lummi and a possible helo launch.

I called our on duty battalion chief & requested he stand down on the helo until I made some phone calls. I told him the likely scenario of a shuttle down wind run from Wildcat to Marine or Squalicum, and that only a few guys around here had the skills to be out in that wind (although it had died a bit by then). And that falling off a board is kinda part of the game. Anybody that's seen me paddle knows this. 20 minutes later, a few text messages etc and I'm talking to the guy who was out doing the Wildcat to Marine run on paddleboards with 2 other guys. We established that there were no “paddler vehicles” left at Wildcat when he picked up his car. He also ended up speaking with the fire engine crew at Marine Park. All accounted for… no emergency. Glad that no helo went airborne.

Not sure what the point of my report is, other than these are the things that happen behind the scenes. One call to 911 from Joe-citizen that assumes no one would be crazy enough to paddle on a day like that puts a lot of wheels in-motion. I've had the Coasties called on me 3 times now, so it was interesting to see the other side of the game.

Beau Whitehead

Reivers Dustin
04/09/17 #21011

Man, thought we were past all that. When we first started our regular Saturday runs there would be calls on every windy Saturday. It would be great if we could have our fun and not abuse all the first responders in the county.

rd

lori & beau whitehead

04/09/17 #21015

No one will ever call 911 on you Reivers, because you never look “distressed.” Unlike myself & some of my cohorts.

Beau Whitehead

David Scherrer
04/09/17 #21016

Oh, I don't know about that………

D.