Just another paddle until...

Angus and his buddies, Andy Morris and Georg Wachter, had launched at Nahoon River Mouth near East London, South Africa, for a lunchtime paddle on Monday, 6^th June.

They headed out, paddling steadily towards the reef at Nahoon Point.

“It’s such a familiar spot,” says Angus, “we often go through there.”

There was a NE swell, and a SE breeze and the waves were hay-stacking a bit, so the three paddlers went a little wider than normal.

 

The incident site - just off Nahoon Point

Upheaval

“We were just behind where the surfers go when it happened,” he says.

“I just felt an upheaval under the boat; I didn’t know what had happened. Then came the crunch, crunch…

“The image in my mind is of the thing in front of me, thrusting and biting at the ski.

“I don’t know how I was sitting on the boat,” says Angus. “I just remember that it was so close that if it had lunged towards me, it would have been right on me. I can’t remember where my feet where; I just have the impression that it was biting right to left in front of me.”

Andy Morris was paddling right next to Angus when the shark hit. “We were just far apart enough that we didn’t hit paddles,” he says. “We were chatting… actually I think I was moaning about lawyers…”

“The next thing, I saw the shark in front of Angus, munching at the ski; I was really concerned for Angus’ legs.

“I think what happened was when the shark hit, Angus must have been flung out of the cockpit onto the back deck, and the shark was actually holding the ski steady while it was biting it.

“When the shark finally let go, the boat was in two pieces and Angus must then have slipped into the water.”

“That’s not good…”

“Then it was gone,” says Angus. “I fell into the water and was trying to clamber onto anything that was there.

“I saw a big chunk of ski floating past and thought, oh, oh, THAT’s not good!”. He laughs…

The others yelled at Angus to get on the back of their skis.

But Angus didn’t want to swim away from the wreckage, knowing what was under the water.

“It was terrifying,” he says. “I was clinging to what was left, I didn’t want to leave it.”

Andy paddled alongside and Angus climbed onto the rear deck of his ski. “Andy paddles a Fenn Elite,” says Angus. “It was quite a balancing act, not the speed one would have liked, it was a very slow paddle back to the beach.”

Angus was only too aware of his legs still dangling in the water. “It wasn’t lekka!” he laughs. “My eyes were fixed on the water, trying to spot the shark.”

He still had his paddle, and it was dragging in the water. “I told him to drop it,” says Andy. “Georg picked it up, but it was difficult to hold in the choppy water and he fell off. He decided to leave it after that,” Andy chuckles.

“It seemed like an eternity to get back. Probably took 10-15min,” says Angus.

“The surfers were all at ‘Corner’ and we shouted to Georg to get them out of the water. He paddled over to them, told them what had happened, and they cleared out.”

When they reached the backline, Angus slipped off the ski and swam in. “By then I knew I was safe,” he says, “but it was still horrible to be swimming.”

The shark left a massive hole...

McGregor and Fenn swept around the 27km course from Green Point's Oceana Power Boat Club, around Robben Island and back to beat defending champion Andy Birkett, paddling with Uli Hart this year.

The veteran Cape Town pair of Jasper and Dawid Mocké finished third in spite of taking an unscheduled swim as they rounded Robben Island, where the paddlers had to negotiate some massive, breaking waves.

The woman's race was won by the Durban pairing of Michelle Burn and Saskia Hockly, who expertly utilised the downwind swell on the way back to the finish to come home ahead of Candice Murray and Kira Bester.

Michelle Burn and Saskia Hockly on their way to claim the Women's Title

The organisers of the prestigious annual Freedom Day surf-ski race had earlier delayed the start by an hour because of poor visibility as a sharp wind blew a rain squall across Table Bay. But conditions had improved considerably within that time, with some sunshine even appearing as the wind eased off.

Both the men's and women's races were decided on the downwind run home as paddlers rode swells pushing them towards the finish.

Disaster

But even before the downwind section, disaster struck for the hotly-tipped pair of Kenny Rice and Clinton Cook.

"It was about 10 to15 minutes after the start," recalled Cook. "We were five boats in a line and we were the fourth boat. It was quite choppy and nobody's fault, but when our tail went down their front (the boat immediately behind) came up and basically put a hole through our boat.

"I jumped out to have a look and said to Kenny that we are not going to make it around the Island ... we'd probably have sunk half way there."

As they limped home, the four other leading boats were rounding Robben Island, where misfortune struck the veteran Mocké brothers.

"We had a bit of a mishap at the back (of Robben Island) ... we took a swim," said Dawid. "A wave clipped us and we capsized and then we were in a solid fourth place, so we had to put the hammer down after that."

He added that the conditions around the back of the island were "probably the biggest I have seen on that side".

The Start: The paddlers faced a gruelling grind out to Robben Island into a brisk northwester.

A "Proper" Miller's Run

The forecast said the wind was going to be just over 20kt.

When I arrived at the club, the meter was reading 29-30kt with gusts over 40, and streamers of sand were flying across the road - a confirmation if any was needed of very strong wind.

We helped each other carry our skis to the trailer; it wasn’t a day for trying to carry a ski on your own.

Just before we left, Kenny Rice (current world champion) arrived back from his Miller’s. He had a wry smile on his face - and said that it was hectic at Miller’s Point with the wind reflecting off the mountain and gusting straight out into the bay. “The first run I got was towards Gordon’s Bay,” he laughed.

Hmm...

Sandblasting

As we drove along the road towards Simon’s Town the bus was unusually quiet as we contemplated the maelstrom on the bay. At Glen Cairn, the sand was hurtling over the road, sandblasting the cars...

In Simon’s Bay, normally fairly protected, especially in a SSE wind, there were squalls lifting spray off the surface. Oh boy.

And as we left Simon’s Town, heading towards Miller’s Point, we could see a haze over the water - normally the spray is blasted off in distinct sheets, here it was just a continuous layer of spray as far as the eye could see.

My personal redline on launching at the south ramp at Miller’s Point is: is there a combination of sheeting spray and swell? A couple of elite paddlers (Mark Keeling and Dyllan Farrell) were launching so we all perforce went down to the ramp to look at the water. The sea outside Rumbly Bay was a boiling, churning mess... (Even so, I might have attempted it, had the wind not been blowing almost directly offshore.)

The rest of us drove to the north (chicken run) ramp, in the shelter of Miller’s Point itself.

Even if we’d wanted to, it would have been almost impossible to paddle back up to the rock that marks the "official" start of the Miller's Run - and we just paddled on a little way out before turning downwind.

The paddle itself was interesting; as expected, the first couple of km were quite unpleasant, the wind blowing us towards Muizenberg instead of Fish Hoek. The small, but rapidly growing wind chop pushed us diagonally across the even more rapidly growing swell which was breaking across from right to left.

After a km or so, the wind straightened out and we headed directly to Fish Hoek.

 

Conditions

Conditions could hardly have been better: the beloved Perth Doctor came to the party with a 20kt and strengthening blow, whipping up superb downwind conditions for the field – perhaps the strongest field ever, with the depth of talent on display. The five South African visitors were joined by a stunning array of Australia’s best – as well as stand-out Europeans like “Flash” Gordan Harbrecht.

In the events leading up to the big one, it was Australia all the way with the best results from the Saffa squad being Hank McGregor’s fourth in the West Coast Downwinder last weekend and Mark Keeling’s fourth in the Sunset Series race on Thursday and his third in the Dash for Cash yesterday.

But it all came right today.

“There wasn’t a lot of paddles down for the first 10 k.  It was hectic, but I felt really comfortable. After such a terrible week of results I’m pretty stoked,” said Rice.

Here at home in South Africa, family and friends of the SA team had been concerned; a concern shared by the boys down under…

“This morning we were trying to nut out how to beat the Aussies.  Cory and Tom had been so dominant all week.  But to come through for a clean sweep was awesome and puts a happy spin to the week for us

“I got some great runners coming in and they carried me through to the beach and there we go Saffas one, two, three,” said Rice.

"Saffas 1, 2, 3": L-R Current ICF Junior Champion Uli Hart, Current ICF World Champion Kenny Rice, Mark Keeling

Dani Dominates

In the women’s Doctor, defending champion Danielle McKenzie dominated. Arch-rival and current world women’s champion Jemma Smith started strong, winning the Hot Spot 1km from the start at Rottnest Island, but it was McKenzie who broke away, delighting in the wave action whipped up by the 20kt winds.

“So much fun out there today crossing the channel.  Just surfing the waves, hooting along.   Just loved it.  Didn’t see too many people around me, so I just powered on and came home and won the one that counts,” said McKenzie.

Her result makes it two victories in two appearances after winning the race in 2019 – the last time the Doctor was run, pre-covid.

Clearly swapping to a new boat manufacturer – she switched to Epic Kayaks just two weeks ago – didn’t prove a handicap.

The stand-out result in the women’s race must be the performance of US paddler Ana Swetish, taking third in her first Doctor and beating South African ace Michelle Burn.

Ana Swetish (USA), Danielle McKenzie (NZ), Jemma Smith (Aus)

Overall WA Race Week Champions

First Australian home in men’s racing was Australian endurance paddler Cory Hill from the Gold Coast, who crossed fourth – and with his solid results from earlier in the week (1, 3, 2, 15) his placing was enough to see him crowned the ultimate champion for WA Race Week and win $15 000 in prize money.

The other stand-out paddler of the week, Tom Norton from the Gold Coast, came home 8^th in the Doctor and took 2^nd overall in the WA Race Week tally after his two wins, 2^nd and a 10^th earlier in Race Week.

Rice and McKenzie picked up $8000 each for their DOCTOR wins, and McKenzie added $15 000 to her prize haul for winning WA Race Week bringing her week winnings to well over $23 000.   Rice finished third in the WA Race Week standings.

Rice’s effort today missed out on smashing Hill’s race record.  It still stands (a 1h33.20 s time set in 2017), and McKenzie still holds Doctor record (1h47.16s) which she set in 2019.

“I made a conscious effort to paddle a bit further out to avoid the melee and to take advantage of the westerly pushing us back in.  It was tactical decision, that paid off.  It’s a great way to start the week,” said Hill.

Third was Australia’s Olympic sprint canoeist, Riley Fitzsimmons who showed he can mix it with the endurance competitors, finishing in 1h23.58 second.  It was a clean podium sweep for the powerful Northcliffe club from the Gold Coast, with Hill, Norton and Fitzsimmons all racing under the maroon and white colours.

South African veteran, 44-year-old Hank McGregor was the first international home in fourth (1h24.35), and Perth’s Michael Booth rounding out the top five.  (1h24.44s).

 

First-timers

Alex Topliss and his friends had been planning the paddle for a while and finally the forecast seemed perfect: the predicted 20-25kt southeasterly should give exactly the right conditions for a first-time Miller’s Run. Not that it was the first time for Alex; growing up in Fish Hoek, he’d done countless of the runs, but he was eager to share the route with his friends, who’d all been paddling for a year or more, but who hadn’t had the opportunity to do the famous (infamous?!) route themselves.

Three of them would be on single skis, while Alex took a double with a fourth neophyte.

Prep

At Miller’s Point, Alex pre-flighted the others, making sure that they all had leashes and mobile phones and that they knew the route: launching at the south ramp, they’d paddle out to the traditional start at Bakoven Rock before heading downwind to Fish Hoek via Roman Rock Lighthouse.

Alex knew that they were all competent paddlers – and, importantly, had practiced deep-water remounts. They were to try to stick together.

When they attempted to start the SafeTrx tracking app on their phones, however, they struggled. The mobile signal at Miller’s Point isn’t good at the best of times and there was an electricity blackout (“load shedding”) which can cause further signal degradation – not all cell towers are equipped with standby generators.

Tentative

The 800m paddle out to Bakoven Rock is intimidating: the ramp is situated in Rumbly Bay, named for the pebble beach that literally rumbles as the waves strike the pebble shore. In big conditions, the waves rear up, threatening to break and close out across the mouth of the bay.

Happily, on this day it wasn’t that gnarly, but the conditions are always tricky as you paddle diagonally into the wind and waves with breakers smashing into rocks of Miller’s Point itself to leeward and Alex could sense his friends were tentative as they made their way out.

The group had agreed that the faster double would start after the single skis in order to sweep behind them.

First Swim

At the rock Alex hit the start button on his Garmin. It was 17h08 – with sunset at 19h06, they should easily have an hour to spare…

But they’d barely gone a kilometer when Alex heard a yell: Chris, one of his buddies, was swimming in the water and had lost his ski, which had already rolled some 30m away from him.

Steering towards it, the pair managed to come alongside and grab it. Briers, the paddler in the back, got into it.

“You’re always a bit shaken when you swim,” says Alex, “so Briers stayed in the single, and I put Chris in the back of the double.”

Settling down, the three men headed off again towards the lighthouse. A little while later, Briers lost his balance and fell off the single ski. His remount was quick, and they set off again.

In the meantime, the lead pair of singles had vanished and made their way successfully to Fish Hoek.

And then…

Roman Rock Lighthouse is the iconic symbol of the Miller’s Run. The rocks lie some 2km directly offshore from Simon’s Town and 5km from Fish Hoek. Seaward of the lighthouse, a reef breaks when the waves are big – and you can shoot a gap between the reef and the lighthouse - if you know where to go.

The roller coaster ride near the lighthouse adds a fillip to the adrenalin; as you surf past, you hit reflected waves coming off the base of the lighthouse, fantastic fun…

For Alex and his mates though, a km past the lighthouse, the fun stopped abruptly.

“The wind had picked up quite a bit,” says Alex. “Briers fell off again – and his boat shot away. We tried to grab it but ended up swimming ourselves.”

By the time the two men had remounted the double ski, the single had disappeared, carried off by the wind and breaking waves.

Paddling back upwind, they came alongside Briers. By now it was nearly 6pm and the light was beginning to fade.   Although the water was relatively warm (19C in False Bay), it wouldn’t be long before they started to get cold. It was time to call for help.

Emergency Calls

“We took our phones out and tried to activate SafeTrx,” says Alex. “It didn’t seem to work, so I tried to call my mom. I couldn’t get through to her so then I tried calling Dawid Mocke. That didn’t work either!

“Finally, I was able to get through to the NSRI emergency number and told them that we were 4km off Glen Cairn in line with the lighthouse.”

The SafeTrx Notification on the NSRI Ops Room Computer

SafeTrx Notification

When the emergency button on SafeTrx is pressed, two things happen: the app itself sends an emergency message AND it attempts to make a phone call to the rescue authorities (here in South Africa, that’s the NSRI).

Unknown to the three men, although they didn’t think they’d successfully triggered the emergency, the app had in fact sent a notification, which the NSRI received at 18h05

So, when Alex dialed the NSRI number himself and got through to them, NSRI already had his position, thanks to the SafeTrx message.

The NSRI Emergency Operations Centre alerted the nearest Sea Rescue base – in Simon’s Town - and they commenced their activation procedures.

“Eyes On”

Knowing approximately where the paddlers were, the NSRI sent a shore crew to a point on the road with a view of the area. Scanning with binoculars, they spotted the double ski just north of the lighthouse.  In addition the NSRI sent out a message to a group of coastwatchers and within moments, half a dozen more volunteers, most of whom live on the heights above Simon's Town were also scanning the ocean.  "Whenever we get a call out," says Station Commander Darren Zimmerman, "we message our coast watchers.  Their information comes into the control room and they can be very effective."

With the guidance of the shore crew, the Spirit of Surfski II RIB was able to speed directly to the double’s location.

Although it felt like an age to the three men, in fact the rescue was remarkably fast. From the time Sea Rescue Simon’s Town was activated to the point where Chris was lifted from the water, less than 25min had elapsed.

“I was beginning to feel a bit chilly,” says Alex. “I’d put Briers in the back of the double and told Chris to lie on the back deck.

“We’d started to try and steer towards Fish Hoek when the NSRI arrived.”

"Spirit of Surfski II" near the Roman Rock Lighthouse

“SafeTrx takes the ‘search’ out of Search and Rescue”

Chris boarded the RIB while Alex and Briers paddled on downwind to Fish Hoek.

A little while later, the missing surfski came ashore on the rocks near Glen Cairn and was recovered without damage.

The NSRI commended the three for staying calm, using SafeTrx and for staying together.

So why write about this almost non-event of a rescue?

What happened?

At 3pm on Friday afternoon 26 Feb, 2021, a 46-year-old set off on his own, to paddle in Bakoven Bay, Cape Town.

He was equipped with a PFD, a leash and he was paddling a Fenn Blue-Fin S.  He had his keys in a waterproof pouch but didn’t have his mobile phone or any other communications gear.

At just before 7pm, the National Sea Rescue Institute was alerted that he was missing and that it was suspected that he might still be at sea.

The NSRI launched both land and sea searches, with three sea rescue craft conducting a search between Oudekraal and Table Bay until midnight. They resumed the search at dawn, assisted by the EMS/AMS Skymed rescue helicopter, which finally found the man’s body, still tethered to the ski on Saturday morning, some 4.5 nautical miles (8.3km west of Bantry Point).

Deceptive Conditions

The southeaster blows directly offshore on the Atlantic coastline, and it can appear deceptively calm in the lee of the shore, close to the rocks. But a few hundred meters out to sea, the wind, accelerating down the mountainside, can be lashing the water with squalls of 50kt or more. And of course, those howling squalls can arrive without warning, as the southeaster grows in strength.

So, it’s possible for a paddler to feel safe in the sheltered water close to the rocks, but in extreme danger from the maelstrom of wind and spray, just a few hundred meters offshore.

Adding to the risk is the water temperature. Strong southeasters cause upwellings of cold water: as the warmer surface layer is blown offshore, it’s replaced by frigid water flowing up from the deep. On Saturday morning, the water temperature at Bakoven was 8.5C.

Speculation

One can only speculate what happened, but it wouldn’t be the first time that a paddler has been caught out by the conditions on the Atlantic side of the peninsula.

He could easily have strayed just a little too far out to sea, or simply been caught by a squall close to shore. Once in the water, he’d have a very short time to remount before becoming too cold to do so.

The further he drifted out to sea, the stronger the squalls and the more difficult it would be to paddle back into them.