Q: What safety equipment is required or suggested on a kayak?
Dean Porter, Anlwick, Northumberland
MC says: First things first, look at what you must wear. Suitable clothing is required to keep you warm and preferably dry if you end up in the water. A drysuit is the top choice with a sufficient thermal base layer for the water temperature. I use the Palm Bora with a Weezle diving undersuit and booties and a hat.
You need a decent Personal Flotation Device (PFD). I use a Palm Kaikoura, which has sufficient pockets to carry all my kit. On this I have a whistle, a line cutter on one shoulder and a blunt-ended serrated knife on the other. The last thing you want to do is drop your only means of getting out of a tangle. On one shoulder is my McMurdo Personal Locater Beacon (PLB), which can alert the rescue services to my position quickly.
In a pocket of my PFD is my Standard Horizon VHF Radio (this requires a licence and an RYA Short Range Certificate to be legally carried and used). I also have a flashing light attached to my shoulder and SOLAS reflective tape on the kayak and my PFD. That’s the sum of my personal safety kit, though I do take a mobile phone in an aqua pack.
WEATHER KNOWLEDGE
I don’t carry a first aid kit, although I have one in the car and I have never needed one on the water. I don’t have flares and have replaced mine with a PLB after my coastal pack expired. I had a dangerous situation with a pack of mini flares, which love to corrode so require loads of wrapping to keep them waterproof. When I tried to launch one that welded itself to the launcher, it had to be thrown out of the way very rapidly. I hate the things and would never carry flares on a kayak again. I don’t want to melt a hole through a plastic hull.
I wear sufficient clothing from launch and don’t need any spares, which would probably get wet anyway.
I have a deck compass on each of my kayaks in case of fog or darkness. I don’t carry food or drink in general, though an all-day session in summer does require a litre of water to avoid dehydration and the attendant headaches. You may want sunscreen in summer. A spare paddle or sea anchor can be considered, though I don’t tend to carry either. You could put some blocks of expanded foam in the hull in case it gets holed.
One of the best safety considerations is knowledge of the weather. These include wind strength and direction and their effects on the surface of the sea dependant on current direction and state of tide, the likelihood of fog, tidal strength and flow, areas where rips and eddies, tidal races and overfalls occur, and the weather conditions 24 hours either side of your session.
Knowing the general movements of other craft in your area is useful. Set your VHF to a working channel used by local harbours and other craft to monitor this, alongside Channel 16.