Folks....this post was supposed to be about the budget..but that will have to wait....
This morning in the news...22 Kids fell into Kampar River......19 was found alive 1 dead and 2 still missing......
Let me tell you a bit about the Kampar River that I know.......in doing so I will share with you about the few things in life that I treasure most.....
I am a river runner.......since the Mid-90's I've traveled Malaysia in search for a sweet spot to do a first decent on Rivers......
And the kind of rivers that i go for are the kind of rivers that you cannot swim.........only for paddling either a kayak or a raft with commercial passengers........it is a sport that requires constant recalibration of what you are doing as the river changes its flow characteristics depending on the level of the water and if there are any changes in the "obstacles" or object such as rocks, tree branches etc that disrupt the flow........(very different than playing basketball as the court is the same 24/7 365 days)
To run a rapid or a river one must know exactly what is ahead...a complete mental picture....similar to a F1 driver knowing the lines........
During all of the many decents my group did.....safety has always been primary.......and safety is also decided 'personally' by the individual kayakers......as one knows ones limit.....as the saying goes....kalau nak telan air liur pun tak boleh...after looking at the rapid.....then you better portage..i.e carry your boat across...this process is called "scouting" the rapid.....where the safety kayakers would survey the incoming rapids to gauge the "line" and also position safety points where we would have a "throw-rope" just in-case some one swims.......i.e bails out of his boat by pulling the wet skirt..and takes his chances with the rapid outside his kayak....
a "throw-rope" is essentially a typical climbing rope chucked into a small bag......what we would do just in-case some one falls into the river n is being swept away..is to shout "ROPE!!!!!" once those in the river provides visual contact(we wont throw if you don't provide visual as it is nearly impossible to pull back and put in the rope into the bag for a second throw..by then u'd be gone)..then we would throw the rope as close as we can so that they can grab on to it..and slowly swim to the safety of the river bank or any high point above water in the river...but we would always avoid swimming towards fallen branches or what we called in our lingo "strainers"....these are potentially death traps..where one can easily get trapped under water.....
I've done up to Class 5 Rivers both in Malaysia (yes folks there are Class 5 rivers deep in Belum Valley..especially during Oct-Jan rainy period) and abroad.....and have spent some considerable time of being held hostage for minutes under rapids the size of a single storey house.......
When you are under....and here I'm assuming that you are wearing a PFD or Personal Floating Device......you would be most likely be in a washing machine like environment where you are being tossed around like a piece of underwear in a large LG 150 Liter Machine.....or you could also be stationary.....whereby you are unable to swim up or down depending on the water dynamics interacting with the 'Hole" that you are in......
The trick is don't panic and try to swim down instead of of swimming up......and hope that the "Hole" will wash you out a few meters away from the rapid..........
And once you are swimming down river what you need to do is that you must keep your feet up...and try to swim in a manner that your feet is pointing forward and you are using your hands mostly to keep yourself afloat and use your feet to kick the incoming shit ahead of you like boulders etc.....you see this position is possible as one is wearing the PFD....whereby most of our body weight is transferred to the PFD.......and your goal is to swim as fast as possible to the river bank........
All of this folks I am talking in the context of a fast flowing river........not a river that is calm and slow flowing.........
The Kampar River that I know.....is dotted with a few Class 3 Rapid.......for someone like me kacang putih with all the safety gears........but once I'm not wearing my PFD's, or having a throw rope on my side and swimming butt naked without my boat or paddle....that's another story altogether.....
The Kampar River gradient is not too extreme and the river banks are pretty easy to access both from the ground and from the river......(what i mean by access from River is when you are facing a Gorge or a Wall/Rock face on either side of the river.....so technically you cannot swim to either size and have to float along until you can...and in these kinda places rescue can be very difficult at best).....
So now folks imagine the 22 Kids......
1. From the picture it seem the Camp site is by the River Bank...Was the children briefed about proper safety procedures?, are there anyone at the Campsite-aka guides who are certified white water rescuer? Were the children allowed to swim? What is exact location of this Camp, are they any rapids down river?
2. What were the ground rules?....What are the safety procedure for the crossing? Are children allowed to cross on their own ? More specifically what is the MAXIMUM Tolerated Weight of this Bridge- I'm assuming 22 Kids weighing around 30 Kilos...that is around 600 Kilos(maybe more was on it at that time)?
3. What was the flow like during the actual incident? What it low flow, high flow? This would give us a good mental picture of what would happen once the bridge collapses and how would the kid react.....from my readings the currents was "strong" - testimony from K.Mathivanan 12 years old
So folks let me try to paint a mental picture of what happened.....
First the children are clearly unsupervised and are left on their own to play......they started to get on the bridge and begin jumping up and down........assuming the bridge snaps and from the picture I think it snapped in half......those in the middle would fall directly into the river and those more towards the left and right would be holding on the fallen bridge.......
Once the bridge is in the water... it is highly probable that it would then flip as the water flow would throw the weight off from the base....this is basic fluid dynamics....so once the flip happens some of the kids would be completely thrown into the flow of the river.....a few who are more to the left/right could still hang on.........for those who are unable to grap the bridge anymore would then float into the flow......
In the midst of all of these we must also ask how many of these kids could actually swim in calm water first.....as those who are non- swimmers would panic more and could possibly grab what ever they can..........even their friend's head and try to push it down in order to breathe.......
amidst all this panic now...
Imagine a dark, noisy and fast flowing river ahead of you.............without a PFD....a child stands a very small chance against the current..........
But we as human are equipped with our own defense mechanism.....our survival instincts will kick in..and the 19 survived the ordeal...and have lived another day to tell us exactly what happened...
To the family of Dina Devi Nathan...my condolences and to the 2 Missing Kids......my prayers are for your safety.........
By the way who's blardy idea is it to have 298 kids running around in one go........I know the required logistics to handle adults up to 100 in an environment close to the river........but 298 kids is another story altogether.......
