Kayak SF to Hawaii

Been following Cyril who will be kayaking from SF to Hawaii and launching at 5am Monday morning from Fort Baker. 

https://www.instagram.com/cyrildx/

Should be interesting to follow.  I followed 2 other people last year who rowed from SF to Hawaii, Lia Ditton was capsized twice during her attempt and she made it back onboard and finished the journey.  Crazy stuff.

Thanks for posting this, Bdon, I'm going to follow the trip as well.

Ed GIllet kayaked to Hawaii in 1987 in a much less fancy kayak. See https://explorersweb.com/2020/12/28/top-expeditions-1970-2020-5-ed-gillet-kayaks-to-hawaii/.  He almost died, but he made it.  I always wondered, how did Ed perform bowel movements during his trip? I suspect that Cyril has some kind of nifty arrangements for that in the cabin behind the cockpit of his kayak.

Wow thanks for sharing! I remember reading about Ed Gillet and how difficult his journey was.  I still think about the school of mahi-mahi that hung around his boat and became dinner.

Best of luck to Cyril

Solo kayaker on journey from SF to Hawaii rescued near Santa Cruz

https://www.kron4.com/news/bay-area/man-kayaking-alone-from-sf-to-hawaii-rescued-after-boat-capsizes/#:~:text=On%20May%2031%2C%20Derreumaux%20hopped,All%20rights%20reserved.

My wife was happy that we have the Alaska Airlines credit card. We got it specifically so that we get a companion fare to Hawaii, and I don’t have to kayak there all the way....

Hooray for a successful rescue! 

    I think people who do these things should have to pay the cost of the rescue effort.   
    He put the entire CG crew in a needless danger having to pull his dumbass out of the water.     

Last couple of days have been hellacious on the big blue. Gales and such. Not a good weather window to launch into.

    I think people who do these things should have to pay the cost of the rescue effort.   
    He put the entire CG crew in a needless danger having to pull his dumbass out of the water.     

Widely publicized feats like these are usually handled in close coordination with the USCG.  Often times, they are paying the USCG for their services.  From everything I've gathered while following this trip closely, this was not a situation where they went and called 911 and launched a helo on a SAR case without any warning.  The USCG has been tracking this event, Cyril's team has been in touch with the USCG as the conditions were declining and the decision was a coordinated decision between all parties of when to pull him off.

I'd much rather have those types of SAR cases than the random sailboater that gets demasted in shitty weather and pops their EPIRB.  The conditions weren't crazy by USCG standards anyway.

  The conditions weren't crazy by USCG standards anyway.
[/quote]

I've seen the Coasties parked in the breakers of Pacifica Esplanade beach, stern to the shore just getting beat up by huge surf. Some kind of exercise in group vomiting or the raddest reverse surfing ever.  Either way I'm stoked they're out there working to sort out the sh!t sandwiches our ocean going collective serve up.

The conditions weren't crazy by USCG standards anyway.

I've seen the Coasties parked in the breakers of Pacifica Esplanade beach, stern to the shore just getting beat up by huge surf. Some kind of exercise in group vomiting or the raddest reverse surfing ever.  Either way I'm stoked they're out there working to sort out the sh!t sandwiches our ocean going collective serve up.

The USCG has a school up in the state of Washington for that ,Tedski would know more.

<threadjack>
What you observed was probably a 47' Motor Life Boat out of Station Golden Gate conducting surf drills.  Those are the self-righting boats that are rated at 20' breaking surf (30' seas) and 50 knot winds.  As you can imagine, maintaining station in breaking surf so your crew can recover a victim alongside would be quite challenging.  So, sitting in the surf and building that muscle memory of feeling the boat move under you, jockeying the throttles to keep the bow into the dominant force and maintaining situational awareness of water depth and surrounding hazards/changing conditions is a good drill to make a regular occurrence.  Each morning, they have to get underway and go out to the Potato Patch Shoal outside the gate and provide an on-scene "bar report."  If there's no breaking surf on the bar, they then go to other areas like Pacifica or Ocean Beach to get those drills knocked out.  The folks that are doing this are called Surfmen.  They're the elitist boat operators in the USCG.  They train at the school Spiffy referenced up at Cape Disappointment.
</threadjack>

    I think people who do these things should have to pay the cost of the rescue effort.   
    He put the entire CG crew in a needless danger having to pull his dumbass out of the water.     

I disagree.
Someone else might think any of us are crazy and asking for trouble and should therefore foot the bill for any rescue we might need.
My understanding is that these services are free in order to prevent people from having to make the difficult decision of calling for help, knowing it will cost them thousands of $$$.

    I think people who do these things should have to pay the cost of the rescue effort.   
    He put the entire CG crew in a needless danger having to pull his dumbass out of the water.     

I disagree.
Someone else might think any of us are crazy and asking for trouble and should therefore foot the bill for any rescue we might need.
My understanding is that these services are free in order to prevent people from having to make the difficult decision of calling for help, knowing it will cost them thousands of $$$.

This is exactly right.  The USCG does have cost schedules for repeat negligent offenders (read: intentional false alarms that cause assets to launch and conduct search and rescue) and also for planned events (e.g. you want USCG support for an offshore yacht club event).  This may be the case for Cyril's passage, too, since he was planning a known dangerous trip and had plenty of sponsorship.  However, you are free to be as dumb as you want and the USCG will be there to give you a free ride home.  You may get some fix-it tickets once you get back to shore if you weren't carrying the required gear per the carriage requirements, but those are remedied without fees and via photos in the mail so they're very low on the inconvenience scale.

Don't hesitate to call the USCG -- they are trained in triaging your situation and deciding whether launching assets is necessary, so let them make that decision.

Interesting....how far offshore would they have rescued this guy?  What happens if he needs rescue in the middle of the pacific, would CG coordinate with ships in the vicinity or is he on his own? 

Interesting....how far offshore would they have rescued this guy?  What happens if he needs rescue in the middle of the pacific, would CG coordinate with ships in the vicinity or is he on his own?

First they would coordinate with any ships in the vicinity that are closer than any cutters currently on patrol.  In parallel, they'd divert a cutter or two in the direction of the kayaker's position.  One of those cutters would have a flight deck and helo crew on board to launch when they are within range.  They might also launch a fixed wing aircraft (usually a C-130 out here) to get eyes on scene and run coordination efforts from above.  The US Navy also partakes in SAR operations under direction of the USCG, so if there were any available Navy ships nearby with a flight deck, they could launch a SAR crew, too.