A gentle rain had been falling on and off for three days. When it finally let up, I grabbed my camera and hightailed it down to The River, planning to hike along the portage trail and check out the rapids. The passage of a front always makes for great photos, and with the promise of shafts of sunlight breaking through the clouds, I was hoping for some dramatic shots of the rushing waters. As luck would have it, though, the sun continued to hide his face. Still, the colors were saturated and there was plenty to shoot, so I made my way downstream along the trail. Not far ahead was the first of a series of staircase falls. The River was in flood, or near enough as made no difference. Hundreds of tons of water were pouring over the drop every second. Long before I could see the falls, I could hear the river roar and feel the ground tremble beneath my feet. Then I rounded the final bend in the trail, and a chill, wind-driven mist rose to greet me. A few more steps and the falls came into view, wreathed in tendrils of fog. What a great photo! I raised my camera, aimed, and…nothing happened. The NiMH batteries in my camera had quit on me without giving notice—something they’re prone to do, I’m sorry to say—and that was the end of the photo shoot. I’d been in such a hurry to reach The River that I’d neglected to bring any spares.

Still, I made the best of things, staying by the river to watch the mist thicken until fog shrouded the entire valley. By the time I was ready to hike out, even the quiet pool above the dam was obscured. But someone was on the water. I could hear the characteristic metallic thunk of a paddle shaft striking the gunwale of an aluminum canoe. (Not for nothing has aluminum been labeled “boomalum.”) I couldn’t see the boat, but I guessed that the invisible paddler was a local angler testing the snowmelt-swollen waters. Clearly, stealth wasn’t part of his game plan.

This got me thinking about the times when I’d been caught on the water as fog closed in. Fog has many personalities. Sometimes it’s as wispy as a gauze curtain, rippling languidly in a summer breeze. At other times it’s brooding and blowsy. And then there are the worst of times—the times when fog wraps an impenetrable wall around you and your boat, shrinking your world to a circle not much bigger than the length of a paddle, a world with neither sun nor shore, in which there are only the swash of surf and the cries of birds to remind you where you are. This is fog stripped of any romantic associations. All that’s left is the danger.

And there’s danger even when there are chinks in the wall around you. Yes, when the murk isn’t total, you can see out. At least you can get a glimpse of the larger world from time to time, often enough to spot familiar landmarks or seamarks—if there are any close at hand, that is. But can others see in? That’s the important question. If you’re on Golden Pond, with only loons for company, there’s little cause for concern. But what if you’re in a busy harbor? Or paddling across a heavily traveled shipping lane? Or suppose you find yourself in the middle of a bass tournament, with dozens of competitors racing from one honey hole to the next just as fast as 150 captive horses will take them, every angler driven to win and navigating on GPS and faith? What then?

Well, to begin with, you try to make yourself as visible as possible. (The best strategy is avoidance, of course. But fog doesn’t always appear—or disappear—on schedule.) Bright colors are always a good idea, and that goes for your boat and paddle, as well as your PFD and jacket. Clipping a strobe to your PFD helps, too, although this common practice is outlawed under the International Rules of the Road, except in cases of “immediate danger.” (It is permitted under the Inland Rules, subject to certain technical requirements.) Nor does it hurt to be heard as well as seen. There’s always your trusty whistle to fall back on, though you can also buy portable foghorns, many of which are small enough for paddlers to carry and use. Some of these employ lung power. Others rely on compressed gas. The smaller gas-powered horns are often used by urban cyclists, so if your local outfitter doesn’t carry what you need, try a bike shop. Whatever noisemaker you choose, however, the International and Inland Rules, along with state and provincial laws modeled on them, prescribe specific signals for different classes of vessels operating “in or near an area of restricted visibility,” a condition which includes fog, as well as “mist, falling snow, heavy rainstorms, [and] sandstorms.” Paddlecraft aren’t specifically mentioned in the Rules, but they probably ought to be classed with sailing vessels. The prescribed sound signal? “One prolonged [four- to six-second blast] followed by two short blasts,” at “intervals of not more than two minutes.”

So far, so good. But this strategy has an important drawback. Hooting your horn (or tweeting your whistle) every few minutes can make it harder to hear what’s going on around you, and attentive listening may well be the paddler’s best defense in fog. Power-driven vessels are required to sound a single “prolonged blast” at intervals of not more than two minutes, though there’s nothing to say they can’t make this signal more frequently, and many do. The skippers of licensed commercial vessels can usually be relied upon to follow the requirements in the Rules to the letter. Recreational boaters cannot, however. Luckily, there’s always engine noise…

But suppose you opt to sound off, anyway, in addition to lighting up. Is this enough? Almost certainly not. A canoe or kayak is just a speck in the sea when seen from the bridge of a freighter, even when visibility is good, and you can’t rely on the watch on deck hearing the tinny tweets from your little whistle above the throb of a ship’s great engines. And even if you are seen or heard, it may be too late. A heavily laden ore carrier can take a mile or more to come to a stop after ordering Crash Full Astern. Big ships aren’t squirt boats, after all. The can’t stop (or pivot) on a dime.

So what’s left? Would a radar reflector help? I didn’t know the answer to that question, so I asked an expert… Read more…

 

 
Send a Comment