For those who have a fear of drowning, this may not be a pleasant video to watch.
Sean Rist was “creeking” — a form of kayaking in which riders descend very steep and low-volume white water — on the Boquet River in the Adirondacks, New York, in June 2013 when his kayak was thrown against a rock wall by the rapid water.
Flipped upside down twice and knocked out of his boat the second time, Rist spun in the whirlpool for nearly five minutes. Although the camera looks as if it’s out of the water, Rist was fighting to keep his head above the surface most of the time.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ij-symrxFrg
Friend Aaron Baker and two other kayakers pulled Rist out of the water.
“Without the other guys I would have died in that whirlpool,” he said.
Rist is an experienced kayaker who had ridden the white-water run without incident before this mishap. Another vote for the wisdom of the age-old buddy system!
