Friend missing in dam

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  • Sigblitz

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    9   0   0
    Aug 25, 2018
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    A friend of ours was fishing in Monticello at the dam. He and a friend each put a kayak in the water. He was drawn into the dam current and tossed out. A life jacket was in his posession but he wasn't wearing it. He surfaced twice and disappeared.
    Kayaks are plentiful and cheap. They're not safe for high fast water. And wearing a life jacket is about your only hope for a rescue. I hope he doesn't mind sharing what happened if it gets someone else to wear a life jacket and think about where they launch and water conditions. Prayers to his family. I know they wish he would just come home.
     

    two70

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    Feb 5, 2016
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    Johnson
    Sorry for your loss.

    While it is great advice to always wear your life jacket when on the water, doing so is unlikely to help someone caught in the currents associated with a dam. Dams create an extremely strong circular current where the surface waters flow toward the dam and the sub-surface current flows away once it contacts the dam. Once trapped in that kind of circular current, often the only ways out are to either make it to the edge of the dam and find a way to climb out or move along the bottom below the main current until you are past the circular flow. The bigger takeaway is to stay far, far away from dams!
     

    Mgderf

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    May 30, 2009
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    Sorry about the loss, but I can't garner much sympathy.
    Water levels being what they have been, coupled with the inherint dangers involved around dam currents, it should be all but expected that a deadly situation would raise it's head.

    I'll never understand the mindset that says, "River up? No problem..."
    The Wabash river, and it's tributaries, have taken far too many lives, but it's almost always due to bad judgement and poor decisions.

    DO NOT PLAY IN FLOOD-WATERS!
     

    CindyE

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    Jul 19, 2011
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    north/central IN
    I'm sorry to hear that, I've been following that somewhat. Last I heard, there were 4 drownings in our state over the holiday weekend. I love water, and I used to lifeguard, and I've gone out on the river when the water was up (yeah, I'm one of those people that occasionally makes bad choices, or at least admits to it). Kayaks are great fun, but I try to stay far away from any sizable dams. I know where that one is, I've been fishing there, but on the bank.
     

    Sigblitz

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    Aug 25, 2018
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    They found the body. Waiting on forensics to identify it.
    My wife keeps saying he jumped in to save his friend, who has a baby on the way.
     

    natdscott

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    Jul 20, 2015
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    DO NOT PLAY IN FLOOD-WATERS!

    Not just flood waters.

    The low head dam at Edinburgh has killed a. bunch. of people.

    Same for a good many of those "little" dams. The hydraulics are not understood by most people as they horse around in the headwaters above those structures, but it's an extremely dire situation if somebody goes over, even if it looks really docile.
     

    femurphy77

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    Mar 5, 2009
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    S.E. of disorder
    We were on the Ocoee a couple of years ago and did the "long" route which took us thru the olympic course from upstream. There is one boil there that I believe they called Godzilla and it reacts the same way a low dam does. We got caught up in it during one trip and since the guide was worried about a tip at the end of the trip but I was more concerned about dying so I was a little boisterous in my "urging" the others on the boat to ****ing paddle or die!

    The guide thanked me later for my urgings as he was beginning to worry a little himself.

    The video below is an older one demonstrating the hydraulics of a low head dam, basically your screwed if you find yourself in the boil.



    [video=youtube;QGUTqPwBuHg]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QGUTqPwBuHg[/video]
     
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