Dealing with the worst

Mark R · Post by **Mark R** » Tue Mar 11, 2008 7:09 pm

This came from Pete Knowles, who put it together after running a workshop on 'dealing with fatalities' at the Plas y Brenin Expedition Symposium last year.

http://www.ukriversguidebook.co.uk/fatalities.doc

Dave @ TRC · Post by **Dave @ TRC** » Wed Mar 12, 2008 9:53 am

Now this has brought some debate on my site saying bringing negative feel about trips be for you go is a bad thing

If you start with a negative feelings about a trips your going to have a bad trip and things will go wrong.?

But no one plans to get in a car, or on a river to die ?

Dave

TheKrikkitWars · Post by **TheKrikkitWars** » Wed Mar 12, 2008 11:19 am

Dave @ TRC wrote:Now this has brought some debate on my site saying bringing negative feel about trips be for you go is a bad thing

If you start with a negative feelings about a trips your going to have a bad trip and things will go wrong.?

But no one plans to get in a car, or on a river to die ?

Dave

I thought the pithiness meant it wasn't depressing, just thought provoking; and better to prepare for something that doesn't happen, than to fall apart if it does?

clarky999 · Post by **clarky999** » Wed Mar 12, 2008 11:31 am

If we run a difficult drop, or one with serious consequences, we prepare ourselves and set up safety in case something goes wrong - surely this is just an extension of that?

We all know what the risks are, we have to be prepared to deal with them and all the possible outcomes.

Slartibartfast · Post by **Slartibartfast** » Wed Mar 12, 2008 12:28 pm

I always feel more confident and more positve knowing that I am fully prepared for every eventuality.

NOT being prepared, or finding I am with an unprepared group, always makes me very nervous. In Devon last year I watched people in the summer hire kayaks & attempt to go out on the surf with very little paddling experience. They spent a lot of time with thier heads being smashed into the sand, hitting surfers or rocks, & generally giving kayakers a very bad name.

Dave @ TRC · Post by **Dave @ TRC** » Wed Mar 12, 2008 1:10 pm

Slartibartfast wrote:I always feel more confident and more positve knowing that I am fully prepared for every eventuality.

NOT being prepared, or finding I am with an unprepared group, always makes me very nervous. In Devon last year I watched people in the summer hire kayaks & attempt to go out on the surf with very little paddling experience. They spent a lot of time with their heads being smashed into the sand, hitting surfers or rocks, & generally giving kayaks a very bad name.

I do not envisage us being unprepared . It more the fear that less experienced paddle will have there confidence knocked a bit thinking a bout death or injury on a trip weather it be to Scotland europe or the out back of beyond

I looked at the document and saw positive applications as well as the obvious
IE having the Numbers of the embassy in the country you visiting in-case you lost a passport .
or got arrested, robbed .
Shit happens.

Dave

filo · Post by **filo** » Wed Mar 12, 2008 4:23 pm

The above tips are all common sence if you need to be told them then maybe you should book a loverly week at butlins with your parants.

millsrock · Post by **millsrock** » Wed Mar 12, 2008 5:45 pm

filo wrote:The above tips are all common sence if you need to be told them then maybe you should book a loverly week at butlins with your parants.

EXACTLY!!

Craig

Slartibartfast · Post by **Slartibartfast** » Wed Mar 12, 2008 6:48 pm

I disagree. Never assume everyone has the common sense you have.

Someones instant response might be to phone NOK in a panic and blurt out what happened. The press will want to report all the gory detail, maybe even before the relatives have been told, the Police might want a word and the wrong reaction to the situation may compromise the survivors, who knows? As you say Dave, Shit happens.

Best to put down into writing what needs to happen and those that know can ignore it, those that don't can learn. Either way, the responsible body has excercised it's duty of care.

That was not a dig at you being unprepared by the way Dave, I just meant it as a generic explaination. My apologies if that is how it came across.

Mark R · Post by **Mark R** » Wed Mar 12, 2008 7:52 pm

Dave @ TRC wrote:I do not envisage us being unprepared

Dave @ TRC wrote:Shit happens.

If you really believed that shit just happens, then you wouldn't bother preparing, would you?

filo wrote:The above tips are all common sence if you need to be told them then maybe you should book a loverly week at butlins with your parants.

This sort of attitude is a cop-out.

The points might well be common sense, but I challenge you to deploy cold rationality and common sense when you've just experienced a fatality. Considering the implications before undertaking a hazardous activity will focus you to avoid having to deal with those implications (i.e. to play safe) and - should the worst happen anyway - make you better able to deal with what comes next ... which is, I'm lead to believe, fairly lousy.

Dave @ TRC · Post by **Dave @ TRC** » Wed Mar 12, 2008 8:03 pm

I disagree even with all the prep shits still happens no mater what you cant control out side forces on a group.
But at least the aftermath goes smother if the prep has been done in advance not nice or plesent but true.

Dave

Anorak · Post by **Anorak** » Wed Mar 12, 2008 10:05 pm

http://www.direct.gov.uk/en/RightsAndRe ... /DG_066805

http://www.crusebereavementcare.org.uk/

http://www.childbereavement.org.uk/

Where the Mountain Casts Its Shadow: The Dark Side of Extreme Adventure by Maria Coffey

May above info be superfluous to all of you....

geyrfugl · Post by **geyrfugl** » Mon Mar 17, 2008 10:40 pm

Never assume everyone has the common sense you have.

But the species will never become more intelligent if the less intelligent
are saved from death by natural selection. The nanny state and
excessive precaution in adventure sport will result in humanity
descending in imbecility over a few generations (if we have that long
left...)

On the other hand, natural selection happens to species to which "shit
happens". If we actively choose to allow the stupid to die in order to
improve the future of humanity, is this not eugenics - a form of directed
selection widely regarded as immoral ?

Is risk-tasking adventurous behaviour more prevalent in more intelligent
individuals below breeding age ? There may be no hope for the future...

Andy

Patrick Clissold · Post by **Patrick Clissold** » Mon Mar 17, 2008 10:46 pm

geyrfugl wrote:
Never assume everyone has the common sense you have.
But the species will never become more intelligent if the less intelligent
are saved from death by natural selection. The nanny state and
excessive precaution in adventure sport will result in humanity
descending in imbecility over a few generations (if we have that long
left...)

On the other hand, natural selection happens to species to which "shit
happens". If we actively choose to allow the stupid to die in order to
improve the future of humanity, is this not eugenics - a form of directed
selection widely regarded as immoral ?

Is risk-tasking adventurous behaviour more prevalent in more intelligent
individuals below breeding age ? There may be no hope for the future...

Andy

An opinion also pioneered by Charles Darwin, however he used it in the context that we should not give to the needy.

jasenjordan · Post by **jasenjordan** » Tue Mar 18, 2008 6:34 pm

Tedious,boring,common sense,shit happens.........etc

ATTENTION TO FINE DETAIL ! A professional approch.Which are you?

Slartibartfast · Post by **Slartibartfast** » Tue Mar 18, 2008 7:08 pm

Witness the recent report about that poor 14 year old cadet girl getting trapped under her boat last year and dying. She was issued the wrong life jacket evidently, and they had no communication to the shore apart from thier rapid fire guns and flares.

Can we judge in hindsight so harshly? Did the people in charge assume everyone will know what to do? Was a risk assesment correctly carried out and implimented?

What would you have done in that situation? Could you have coped?

Bod · Post by **Bod** » Wed Mar 19, 2008 9:23 am

filo wrote:The above tips are all common sence if you need to be told them then maybe you should book a loverly week at butlins with your parants.

Common sense is surely not dismissing the well considered advice of persons who have more experience than most?

Adrian Cooper · Post by **Adrian Cooper** » Wed Mar 19, 2008 11:00 am

I have to say I am genuinely surprised at some of the resposes to this thread. Maybe I am out of touch with people who have such a blase attitude to their own and others sensibilities. I have three teenage sons who you would think would be about as 'whatever' as they come but even they would not be so dismissive as some of the comments here.

Chaucer · Post by **Chaucer** » Wed Mar 19, 2008 3:39 pm

Dave @ TRC wrote:
If you start with a negative feelings about a trips your going to have a bad trip and things will go wrong.?

I have never heard such a specious arguement. This is like the one about not giving WW1 pilots parachutes, and sailors not learing to swim.

This is not about tempting fate, or putting bad karma on a trip. It is about proper preparation.

I can't imagine what it would be like to deal with a fatality on a river, but I know that several of the posters on UKRGB and some friends of mine have had to deal with fatalities. I am sure that preparing for all eventualities is a worthwhile exercise. Soldiers practise battlefield medicine and they have a motto - fail to prepare, prepare to fail.

UKRGB

The UK Rivers Guidebook

Dealing with the worst

Dealing with the worst