A kitesurfer rescues two persons drowning - watch the video

[jeromeL]

I'm wondering what would happen if one of them triggered the quick release by mistake. I guess as long as he would hold the bar he would be ok but it would definitely have been harder to brighten back ashore with quick release triggered.

[CaptainArgh]

...
Somehow I made it back to the beach, stopping every now and then to test if I could feel the bottom.
It was strange making it back to shore, almost like I had cheated death. I sat at the waters edge for a while watching the world go by, too exhausted to stand up. I could feel the sand beneath me being pulled out strongly by the tide. People were going about their lives totally unaware of what just happened. I wasn't meant to see any of this...

Great read. Thanks for sharing and of course...glad you made it!

Made me think of secondary drowning which most folks are not aware of. If you make it out of the water, but still inhaled some water, you can drown later safely in your bed sleeping it off. I don't know how likely this is, but certainly something to watch for if you or someone you know has a close call. Kind of like a concussion you have to keep an eye on them after the fact.

A little bit on secondary drowning -

...A person who had a drowning close call can be out of the water and walking around normally before signs of dry drowning become apparent. But all dry drowning results in breathing trouble and brain injury, just as drowning in the water does. If untreated, it can be fatal.

...A person who has inhaled water can have:

Trouble breathing, chest pain, or cough
Sudden changes in behavior
Extreme fatigue

[eree]

So what is the solution? If you are not a trained life guard do you attempt to save someone who has lost their witts and is in Monkey mode?

watching this video is kind of sobering experience for me. never had anything close to what happened in the vid near me.

when i was trained for rescue team on the ships, they taught us never go save the person in distress if it is too dangerous for yourself and you don't have a back up. two casualties is worse than one casualty. then there was the accident response sequence. first you have to inform people around you, there is no point to storm to the rescue if you have to fight for your dear life yourself soon and nobody knows about that.

i think in situations like those on the video first you have to inform the surrounding people. whistle, shout, hand signals, whatever it takes to attract attention. then assess the situation. it is easy if the person needing help is child, but if you are 50kg girl and the 150kg guy gasps for his last air you are most probably outgunned.
in this case i think most safe way to help the person is to throw him your buoyancy aid west or if you don't have it just land the kite on him from the safe distance, then when he grabs the kite, tow yourself to it by pulling the kite lines. kite in the water most certainly attracts attention of the other kiters (of course providing your kite is inflatable LE)

[edt]

if you don't have it just land the kite on him from the safe distance, then when he grabs the kite, tow yourself to it by pulling the kite lines. kite in the water most certainly attracts attention of the other kiters (of course providing your kite is inflatable LE)

Another excellent idea. Land the kite near the drowner he or she will grab it and use it for flotation and then eventually get blown back to shore. I would probably land the kite near them wait for him or her to climb on the kite, then wrap up the lines, detach, swim back to shore and then go for help.

Some really good ideas on this thread.

Remember tho what a drowner is doing. He is bouncing off the bottom, gasps for air, flails his arms against the water and then sinks back down.

There is no ability to swim and grab something more than 1 foot away. So you have to konk the kite almost on their head. If you land it 2 feet away it might as well be 2 miles away, they can not grab it because they are under the influence of the drowning reflex.

[Johnny Rotten]

First off great video, Lior Sason is a BOSS!

They do not grab "the most stable thing they see". This is purely instinctive behavior. Their hands are actually not under conscious control at this point. The reason they grab for the bar is that it is the highest thing they can grab. This is instinctive.

Take away from this is EXPECT them to grab
a) your neck,
b) your bar.

They are drowning and trying to climb OUT of the water, your harness or leash is not NOT gunna let them climb high enough to get their head out of the water enough to subdue panic mode.

Lot's of ways to skin this, risks involved to the rescuer in all cases ...but knowing to EXPECT someone lunging for the bar would hugely increase your odds of a succesful rescue. GREAT video for this reason.

[edt]

after reading all these responses and thinking about it, I think what i would do is go back to shore, at 20mph shouldn't take more than 5 seconds, grab any flotation you can find, a cooler, a sup, a car seat, a large branch, an inflatable toy, whatever you can find, tow it back to the swimmer and let them grab it. The risk for them drowning you is just so incredibly high. It's not like we are swimmers where it takes them forever to get anywhere. We are really fast, so we probably have time to go to shore and grab some sort of flotation and get back before they drown.

if you have never seen this watch it

[Tiago1973]

after reading all these responses and thinking about it, I think what i would do is go back to shore, at 20mph shouldn't take more than 5 seconds, grab any flotation you can find, a cooler, a sup, a car seat, a large branch, an inflatable toy, whatever you can find, tow it back to the swimmer and let them grab it. The risk for them drowning you is just so incredibly high. It's not like we are swimmers where it takes them forever to get anywhere. We are really fast, so we probably have time to go to shore and grab some sort of flotation and get back before they drown.

also my thinking and the reason i wonder why we don´t see kites being used by life guards. not all locations would suit as the best alternative, but in some a kite look really a good way to get near to the person who is in trouble on a blink of an eye

i would not land the kite to rescue someone - i means to be without my own propulsion system, and this can be trouble if you are within waves, and would need to control the lines when the kite itself is being "used" by someone in panic.. too messy

[edt]

also my thinking and the reason i wonder why we don´t see kites being used by life guards. not all locations would suit as the best alternative, but in some a kite look really a good way to get near to the person who is in trouble on a blink of an eye

being from a family with a long history of life guarding I feel qualified to answer that. The reason is that life guards are paid next to nothing. So they can't really afford the training it would take to train their current lifeguards, or alternatively to need lifeguards that already know how to kite would make it too expensive to hire them. Lifeguards in terms of salary rank slightly below burger flippers. Not to mention the cost of having a kite there. I guess you can use your own kite, but if you are a kiter and have a lifeguarding job the chance you are actually working a day when it's blowing good are next to zero. It's cheaper to just give them jetskis and even that is way too expensive for most beaches, you are given a floatie to rescue someone with, not even a SUP unless you bring your own to the job.

[Tiago1973]

also my thinking and the reason i wonder why we don´t see kites being used by life guards. not all locations would suit as the best alternative, but in some a kite look really a good way to get near to the person who is in trouble on a blink of an eye

being from a family with a long history of life guarding I feel qualified to answer that. The reason is that life guards are paid next to nothing. So they can't really afford the training it would take to train their current lifeguards, or alternatively to need lifeguards that already know how to kite would make it too expensive to hire them. Lifeguards in terms of salary rank slightly below burger flippers. Not to mention the cost of having a kite there. I guess you can use your own kite, but if you are a kiter and have a lifeguarding job the chance you are actually working a day when it's blowing good are next to zero. It's cheaper to just give them jetskis and even that is way too expensive for most beaches, you are given a floatie to rescue someone with, not even a SUP unless you bring your own to the job.

make sense

i need to stop seeing so many american movies

[justbob]

also my thinking and the reason i wonder why we don´t see kites being used by life guards. not all locations would suit as the best alternative, but in some a kite look really a good way to get near to the person who is in trouble on a blink of an eye

being from a family with a long history of life guarding I feel qualified to answer that. The reason is that life guards are paid next to nothing. So they can't really afford the training it would take to train their current lifeguards, or alternatively to need lifeguards that already know how to kite would make it too expensive to hire them. Lifeguards in terms of salary rank slightly below burger flippers. Not to mention the cost of having a kite there. I guess you can use your own kite, but if you are a kiter and have a lifeguarding job the chance you are actually working a day when it's blowing good are next to zero. It's cheaper to just give them jetskis and even that is way too expensive for most beaches, you are given a floatie to rescue someone with, not even a SUP unless you bring your own to the job.

Interesting, student lifeguards here in Southern Ontario are pretty well paid from what I've heard.
It's a plum summer job if you can get on with a municipality or the Y.