Wake surfing contest starts today
City worried about erosion by waves, but organizers were given green light by Transport Canada
Three months after cautioning boaters not to make any wakes for fear of eroding the shoreline, the City of Kelowna is hosting the World Wake Surfing Championship.
Powerboats said to produce the world’s biggest wakes will be travelling offshore in front of City Park today, Friday and Saturday.
Long wakes of more than a metre’s depth spread out from behind the boats, providing a continuous surf for 120 athletes expected to compete in the championship.
“It’s a free event, so anyone can come down to City Park and watch the competition,” Chris Babcock, the city’s event development supervisor, said Wednesday.
On the organizer’s website, reference is made to the boats used in the competition being able to “create huge walls of water” and “the biggest, most well-defined waves possible.”
In May and June, as Okanagan Lake rose to record levels with spring runoff, concerns were repeatedly raised about wakes from boats causing significant erosion damage along the shoreline.
“Go wake free on Okanagan Lake!” read one typical message from the Central Okanagan Emergency Operations Centre. “Residents and visitors are encouraged to find non-motorized boating options to enjoy Okanagan Lake.
“Those choosing to use motorized watercraft are urged to be respectful — slow down and keep away from shore so wakes do not cause further erosion or flooding of lakeshore properties,” the EOC message said.
Although Okanagan Lake has long since dropped back to normal levels, city officials did initially have some concerns about giving a permit for the Florida-based World Wake Surfing Championship to take place in the waters off City Park.
“We asked questions about possible erosion,” Babcock said. “The organizers ran the event past Transport Canada, because there are rules and regulations about how far from a beach a boat can travel, and at what speed.
“They got the approvals they need from Transport Canada, so they were good to go,” Babcock said.
Earlier this year, the District of Lake Country considered a proposal to greatly expand no-wake zones on Kalamalka Lake. It prompted concerns about possible damage done to water intake systems from bacterial, hydrocarbon and metal contaminants churned up by boat wakes.
A 35-page consultant’s report said wakeboard and wakesurf boats are particularly problematic in terms of kicking up turbulence and causing erosion along shorelines.
“A wave that is 25 cm high is four times more destructive than a 12.5-cm wave,” the consultants, Kelowna-based Ecoscape Environmental, wrote in the report.
“Additionally, the angle of these wakestyle vessels directs more turbulence toward the lake bottom,” the consultants said. “Therefore, wakeboard-wakesurf boat wakes can have a greater negative impact than other powerboat designs.”
The World Wake Surfing Championship, which has not had much advance publicity, hasn’t triggered any complaints from lakeshore property owners or other members of the public to the city, Babcock said.
The city is always trying to encourage more events outside the busy summertime season, Babcock said. World Wake Surfing Championship organizers had initially proposed the event take place in early October, but they settled on late September.
Babcock said the city would welcome any feedback from the public as part of a standard process to review the impact of events that are held using municipal facilities.