HMB NCKA Rescue 8/16

After a pretty decent day of Salmon fishing today, the Filipino crew - Me, Bob (Taurus987) and Don (Elusive) were trying to catch some bonus RF and Lings at the reef near the jetty close to mouth of the harbor.  Its was really slow.

Bob calls out on the radio that he just saw a kayaker fall out of his kayak.  He added he saw a big splash near the jetty were the guy was fishing.  So we drop everything and run hard towards him.  Bob and Don got to him first and immediately went to action. I kept a safe distance acting as backup.
They positioned their kayaks around him and got in close.  Don was on one side and Bob on the other. The poor guy didn't know what to do. He didn't have a paddle leash and was trying to hold on to his paddle that was floating one way. Then his kayak was moving in another direction.  On top of that his leg was wrapped with fishing line from one of his two rods that went overboard. 

He couldn't pull himself into his kayak.  So Don, on his AI with a one Ama configuration instructed him to sit on top of his Ama.  Then Don told him to now get back on his kayak. Bob grabbed his paddle and other gear so his hands were free.  He was clearly exhausted. It took him several difficult tries to get back aboard. His technique didn't look good.  Finally he did. 

I pedaled towards him and he tells me he is OK and would like to continue fishing.  Judging his condition I told him its not a good idea. I asked him if he had a vhf radio and he didn't.  He was completely soaked and cold.  I told him we were heading in and if something goes wrong nobody was there to help him.  "Your dead in 30 minutes in this water" I straight out told him.  So he decides to come in with us. 

Back at the Old Pier we introduced ourselves.  His name was Jorge and he's been out a couple times.  He was trying to grab something from behind and lost his balance and made him go over the side.
We advised him to get himself a floating VHF radio.  I demo'd mine and dropped in the water to show him it really floats.  We also told him to get better PFD, his head was going down and his PFD was floating above his head.  I showed him my Stolhquist PFD which had multiple adjustment straps. Also to wear a 3 mil Farmer John wetsuit for warmth.  Bob showed him his.  He leaves before us and we say goodbye.

The Filipino Crew at the bottom picture with our Trout catch.

Great job guys!!

HEROS!
Badasses! Quick action level heads! Man you guys represent!
Hats off to you folks. Just another story of the greatness that belongs to this site! Love it!
Hope that guy reads this and realizes he coulda been a statistic if not for you guys.

We should totally have an award at the end of the year for HERO of the year of NCKA.

He was lucky you guys were there. Well done!!!

That could have turned into a bad situation.  I hope he listens to your advice

Nice work guys!  Hopefully he learned something from you guys.

man that trout are thick! thanks for the report and awesome save. 

Yay US!!!


Yay YOU GUYS!!!

Way to step up.  You really might have saved a life today!

Proud of you.  this is the best of NCKA.


Bushy

To be honest that could have been me had I not found ncka. HUGE PROPS TO YOU GUYS!! I hope they join.

Awesome I wanna go fishing with you guys !

Great job heroes! 

Awesome work gentlemen! Mel is definately one the coolest headed dudes out there. Way to save the day and tell the dude how to prevent this from happening again.

Good job guys!

Nice going mel, bob , and don! 

Same thing happened to cabeza de Martino (antonio) today. He got off balance when he was grabbing his ling from the water but he basically got back on his kayak in 2 seconds and fished all day after that. I bet no one saw that because he got on his kayak like nothing  . Antonio even called it saying something about it earlier before we started fishing sorry Antonio had to tell ncka about this.