Water Rescue Team Warms Up for Summer

Sacramento Metro Fire Department’s Search and Rescue team can predict with near certainty it will respond to at least one fatality along the American River at some point this summer.

So the members of Sac Metro's Station 65 water rescue team train. And they train often.

In his 30 years of experience with water rescue, Station 65 Capt. Roy Cameron has seen just about everything one could expect along the American River. He knows the places to hide the alcohol along the river; he knows most people won’t be floating on the river during the major holidays and he knows floaters aren’t always going to be happy to see him.

“We’ve done water rescue calls in the heavy summer time (where there is) alcohol, mud wrestling, pole dancing – someone actually goes out and sets up a pole on an island,” Cameron said. “We had beers thrown at us, rocks thrown at us, mud thrown at us, we were spit upon. We’ll have our emergency lights on; we’re just trying to save someone – I just don’t get it. I really don’t.”

One thing Cameron hasn’t encountered, though, is the record-setting water level speeding down the American River.

Right now the river is running at an all-time high - more than 10,000 cubic-feet per second (CFS).

“Once every six months we like to come out and refresh our skills,” Cameron said. “Summertime is going to be busy for us, especially now since the water flows are higher and that water is so cold.”

According to a crew thermometer, water temperature along the American River was holding at 46 degrees.

Senior firefighter and paramedic, Jason Cornell explained the body’s internal organs tend to tense up, reacting to sudden changes in body temperature as an involuntary way to try to warm the body back to normal. This can have a number of effects upon the body, though maybe none more notable than the increased energy the body will expend trying to keep itself warm.

Cornell explained how often times those requiring rescue from the river can panic first, think second which can be a recipe for disaster.

“We’ll tell them right away who we are, we’re here to rescue them and not to panic,” Cornell said. “If they continue to panic, we’ll dunk them (in the water) and that tends to focus them.”

One training exercise simulated a water rescue in which someone gets tangled in waterlogged debris, also referred to as a “strainer”.

“A strainer is anything in the water – a chain-link fence, a tree, a car – that allows water to go through and nothing else,” Cameron explained. “The flows right now are about 10,000 CFS coming out of Nimbus Dam.”

Cameron explained even when the water flows at 2,000 CFS, if someone got caught up against a strainer, the pressure would be the equivalent of 10,000 pounds pushing against the body.

“There’s no way anyone I know could bench-press that,” he said. “So the way these flows are now, if you get caught in a strainer, you’re going to die.”

This time last year, the weather was much warmer and the water flowing across the American River was moving at about 1,200 CFS, Cameron said.

“You could almost walk across it (the river),” he said. “This late in the year, I’ve never seen the flows this high.”

Cameron explained his water rescue team sees a lot of action in the Fair Oaks area due to the presence of the Pacific Coast Aggregate (PCA) walking bridge near Sunrise Boulevard.

“We get a lot of people jumping off the bridge, which I think is a $250 fine,” Cameron said. “Not only that, there are a lot of snags underneath the bridge as well.”

A common theme Cameron and his team encounter near the PCA are floaters that like to tether their boats together to form large “party barges”. The floaters will tie the boats together upstream of the PCA and attempt to float down. Nearly each time the barges will either get stuck passing under the bridge or capsize when the rafts get tangled between the columns.

Among other popular places, the rescue team will encounter problems near the San Juan rapids as well as a popular tree floaters like to tie a rope swing to.

“There was a year we were out here we rode by the rope swing, saw people swinging, so we pulled over and cut it down,” Cornell said. “We left and on our way back up, someone had already put a new rope up.”

In between the usual fire and rescue calls, Cameron says he tries to get the team out on the water for a couple of hours at least once or twice per week.

This season alone the team has already been on eight water rescue calls. Last season Cameron says he had a 17 total.

“The majority of the calls came after the Memorial Day weekend,” Cameron said. “So far all of our water rescue calls have come before the Memorial Day weekend.”

Cameron encourages floaters to use common sense and to always carry life jackets.

“Our priority is ourselves and the public,” Cameron said. “We want them to be safe, but we want our guys to be safe so we can make sure to keep the citizens safe too.”