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Old 01-03-2005, 09:54 PM
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I just spoke to Ian Young on the phone about the rescue. He was on holiday with his brother and family at Busselton, Western Australia. He had hopes of training for a long distance kiteboarding record attempt but the wind hadn't been cooperating. His sister-in-law was interested in kiteboarding so Ian was coaching her through a body dragging session with a 5 m Flysurfer foil in about 15 kts of wind last Sunday. Not being from the area but a resident of Perth to the south, Ian thought that the tidal activity was remarkable but wasn't aware that it was unusual for the area.

SW Oz is south about 5470 km or 3400 miles of the earthquake epicenter that triggered the tidal wave. Based up on the animation shown at the start of this post, the tsunami seemed to propagate the most intensity to nearer areas to the east and west. The influence in distant SW Oz was in the form of extreme tidal variation.


A view of Busselton beach and the river.
From: http://www.wrc.wa.gov.au/

That is substantial high, low tides with very strong associated tidal currents in the confines of the river and inlet areas to the west of Busselton Pier (see above).

As Ian was working with his sister-in-law when they heard a near hysterical woman screaming for help. They dragged closer to investigate and eventually sorted out that her husband and son and been swept about 150 m from shore by offshore tidal rips caused by the tsunami influenced surcharging of water in the inland river basin. Ian estimated that that outgoing current was on the order of 10 to 12 km/hr (about 6 to 7 mph).

Ian helped his sister-in-law crash the Flysurfer foil to where he could take over control of it, relaunch the kite and get underway. He then body dragged out about 150 m to where the father and son were being helped to stay afloat by Shelly. More about Shelly's important roll is given in the newspaper article above. Ian said it took great courage for the mother of three to swim out alone into strong currents with the intent of saving not just one but two people.

Ian guessed that the father and two boys were playing in the strong outgoing tidal rips in the mouth of the 20 to 30 m wide river when the current took them out of standing depth and into deep water. By the time that Ian had reached the group the father was exhausted from trying to swim against the outgoing current. This as opposed to swimming parallel to shore until he left the area of outgoing tidal currents. A diagram of rip currents caused by sand bars instead of an inlet as in this case, is shown below:


The idea is to swim parallel to shore until you leave the outgoing area of rips currents allowing you to swim into shore at that point.
From: http://www.ecy.wa.gov/

Shelly had been supporting the father for about 30 minutes up to this point. She had no reason to believe that Ian would have happened by to help out. Fortunately, he did however. Ian held the man's hands together around his neck with one hand and used the other to control the kite to body drag into shore. Once he had the father in standing depth of water he dropped him off and proceeded offshore to help the son. The nephew had previously made it to shore before the rescue by swimming parallel to the current. Ian's sister-in-law called emergency services by cell phone for help. By the time Ian had made it offshore again to meet Shelly and the son, Shelly had already dragged the son to within 75 m of shore. Ian clasped both of the boy’s hands around his neck as with the father and dragged him into shore. Shelly made it in under her own steam with a substantial amount of exertion.

The father and son were treated at the local hospital for exhaustion and hypothermia. Ian had returned to his cottage shortly after the emergency crew arrived. He called the police at this point as they had discovered that during the night before their cottage had been robbed of several wallets, cell phones and a camera. NO Justice ... right?! Anyway the police filled Ian in on the excitement that the rescue had caused. The father concluded that he wouldn't have survived but for the heroic efforts of Shelly and Ian.

So, thanks Ian and Shelly for your effective efforts and timely rescue! An able kiteboarder saves the day again.
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