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The River Is CLOSED!

MJ5150

MJ5150

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Staff member
Gold Supporting Member
Apr 12, 2001
17,407
35,710
Edinburg, Texas
#1
I'm watching my late local news before I go to bed as usual tonight, and they are again covering the rising rivers. They are going on about how cold the water is, about 45 degrees, and how swift the current is. We had a recent run of hot weather, which sends people pouring into the local lakes and rivers here since we never know when the sun is going to come back.

Apparently a couple guys were swept away in the current over the weekend, and have not been found. Several others have been rescued. All of this prompts the King Country Sheriff and Pierce County Sheriff to put up these hokey signs on tree stumps near the rivers edge that say "RIVER IS CLOSED".

I thought it was funny that some police department decided to "close" the river. :D

-Mike
 
#3
I've seen that before. Up here in NH they do the same thing pretty much every spring. After the snow run off there are always high rivers with fast moving currents that are extremely cold. And every year several people are swept away into oblivion. The signs IMO are a way to pass on the negligence to the idiots that get swept away.

Cold Water + Fast Current + High Water Level + Careless People = Disaster.
 
#6
Never heard of river closures round here, but the cops do barricade and shut down a certain stretch of roadway here in town that gets flooded every spring. There's always some less-than-intelligent people who pull the barricades aside and try to drive through, only to get their car stalled/sunk, and end up having to be rescued by the Fire dept.
 
#7
They closed the Potomac River near me one year after heavy rains. Sucked too, I wanted to go see who high it was. The high water markers at Great Falls Park showed it was incredibly high.
 
#8
That happens all the time in Central Texas. We have very dangerous flash flooding here, and when the lakes rise very high, they are full of effluent and animal carcasses and chemicals from people's lawns. I don't want to be swept away, or swim with dead deer and cattle, so when the lake's closed, its closed.

My son lost one of his friends in the flooding last year. The kid's boss, who is not from here and did not understand the danger, pressured him to come back to town for his job. He lost his life because of some newcomer who valued a stupid job over the danger, because he was ignorant of it.

We take our creek and lake warnings very, very seriously. We try to educate newcomers to the region, so they will understand the dangers. But, every year, someone ignores the warnings.

The slogan is: Turn Around, Don't Drown! Personally, if I can't see the road markings through the water, then it is too deep to cross safely, period, I don't care what anyone else wants.

Cherie
 
#9
I'm in Washington too, and I find this pretty interesting. Did you hear about the guy in Spokane that the police think faked his death? He supposedly went boating and they found his smashed up boat down river and no sign of him. He was facing some kind of serious criminal charges.
Last year I went canoing in July and we tumped over once. The water was so cold I thought I was going to have a heart attack. I can't imagine wanting to get into this snow runoff and freezing your works off!
 
#10
MakiSupaStar said:
People drown in water all the time. Doesn't mean you close it. That's just silly. Even as a lifeguard at the beach, we can never close the water. Silly I tell you. Silly.
Click to expand...

Well, if you lived in Washington State, and had something like a serious rip tide or undertow at one of your beaches, they would just staple a bunch of big "BEACH IS CLOSED" signs all over the driftwood and dead seal bodies. Then all y'all lifegaurds could go home since the beach was closed.

Yep, it's silly. I felt embarassed for the sheriff's department.

:D

-Mike
 

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