I would very much like to see how this craft would handle the water conditions that existed on the Susquehanna in 1975. Much larger hydraulic jump and a greatly increased downstream boil than at this location. It does appear to be very stable under these conditions.
The craft is incredible. As are the team manning it. But surely it is only likely to save anyone if it is there at the dam and manned at all times when people might get trapped. That would be quite expensive.
wow! that's a really smart design. seems susceptible to tipping sideways though. next thing you know, this'll be a sport. that last clip looked damn fun.
That’s actually what it was originally designed for apparently, running rapids. I’ve seen videos of the “non-rescue” version running Class 5/6 rapids successfully, just like them riding it over that pretty intense dam. It’s one kick butt vessel. I can’t imagine how they came up with the design.
A 25 year old mother and her 3 year old daughter were claimed by the Dock St. dam Harrisburg PA 05/2018. At least 17 people were killed by this drowning machine over the years that was built like most for covering the open sewage pipes and diluting the raw sewage of big cities or for a water suppy for long closed mills at turn of century and are no longer needed.These death machines are all over the country and should be torn down.
You would think they would put a rope handles on the outside and make that hole bigger to get back inside, But other that that alot better than a big hamster ball anyday ;)
It's complicated but it's the same reason catarafts don’t flip often compared to normal rafts. Essentially the base tubes sit in the retentive pocket of the stopper(dam) if water floods over the tube it then just floods through the floor and the natural buoyancy allows it to rise up to the surface. Essentially because there is nowhere for the water to collect and add significant weight to the raft it can't apply enough pressure on any area to cause it to become unstable and capsize. I’ve probably done a bad job at explaining that but hopefully it sort of helps.
They do flip/capsize sometimes violently but the boat design has the patented T-tops & seat belt system that make it possible to ride it out and rite-side your boat much faster.
2:28 Is he standing up to his neck in the water and not being pulled over into the dam? Or is he swimming? How is it that he hasn't been pulled into the actual pourover? He appears to be in the boil line...
In Tumwater canyon just above Leavenworth. I was going to say I thought it was there, also. Am bald someone else noticed the distinctive jointed structure of the dam. I have often thought the canyon would be a tremendous paddle, but not for me. There is one commercial raft company that does the canton, but only with very experienced paddlers and (obviously) portages the weir.
***** OK, I had to go back and check my photos. The background vegetation and embankments do not match up with the lower weir, but thank you for suggesting that as a possibility. Other proof that it is the upper weir is that the observation deck is on the right side of the river (looking upstream) and the observation deck on the lower weir is on the left side (check the Google Earth sat pictures). Also, the observation deck on the upper weir is paved (as is the deck in the vid) and the lower weir observation deck is not paved. So… quite exciting to take this raft over the weir! And that really is an awesome drop!
***** Nice picture. The observation deck is just visible in the photo you supplied and is on the right side of the photo. Also, the weir is (relatively) short. The Google Earth sat picture shows how very long the lower weir is. IN the short spot on the vid, you can see the 'double' cascade where the water falls off both the 'direct' (downstream) flow as well as (in the corner) from the side. makes for an interesting hydraulic feature. I think where you are not seeing it is the perspective of the photo vs the vid. The photo is shot from a more downstream angle, and the vid is shot from the observation deck. I am guessing but it looks like a 150 to 200 ft difference. Again, excellent photo to help us all understand your perspective. DId you take it? Good composition….
The ingenuity of humans just AMAZES me sometimes!!! I live in Osawatomie Kansas and we have an incredibly dangerous Low Head Dam right in the middle of our town! Our water rescue team SHOULD have one of these! Live could be saved. NICE WORK!!!
I second what bigriverunner said. There are several clips here on RU-vid showing low head dam rescueres trying to throw ropes and throw bags to victims who are too weak or unable to reach the rope. They are typically sucked back into the poorover and recirculated. The idea is to keep a Creature Craft inflated, trailered and close to low head dams to extract a victims as quickly as possible.
Response to crinoidcounter - Your suggestion is currently being used by most swift water rescuers / fire dept.s because it is unsafe to go beyond the boil line. Throwing a throw bag to a half drowned victim is NOT the best way as you said, because the many times they are too far out of it to even see the rope/ throw bag if it lands directly in front of them. Creature Craft is the only safe way to actually retreive a victim.
Best way to rescue from a low head dam is to launch a personal watercraft from downstream, run up to just below the boil and throw rope bags to the swimmer, then haul them downstream.
This seems to be the safest thing I've seen for going beyond the boilline on a rescue. It also appears to have an open ended floor system which is important when pulling a partially drowned victim on board. It also looks very stable when they try to push it into the poorover. Without having had actual hands on in a rescue situation I am going to say this looks like the best thing out there.
