Tragical accident in Ladakh
On the 13th of August a kayaker drowned at the overhead dam in Karu (close to
Leh) in Ladakh.
We went out there
to unfortunately only rescue the kayaks.
The kayaker
(ashish) was a trainee kayaker and joined well experienced and responsible tripleader Arvind for
a standard
rafting trip from Upshi to Leh
Upon stopping roughly 200m above the dam in the right hand eddy, the trainee
kayaker went furhter down to
choose another stopping point. While doing so he capsized and never even
attempted a roll. The second kayaker (bhim) immediatly tried to rescue ashish.
both of them unfortunately
got dragged over the dam.
Bhim managed to get out of the backflow, while ashish only got flushed out after about
15minutes.
The tripleader and bhim managed to get to the body and immediatly gave CPR while transporting
the body to the close by army
hospital.
Further life reviving practices were tried but to no success.
Ashish was dead and couldn`t be revived.
We ourselves got called up while
in leh and rushed to the
accident site (30minutes drive distance) to only collect the washed downstream kayaks.
I write this, to avoid
`talks` and
`rumours` which are already spreading here.
There have been companies running (wihout
clients) the dam, a friend raft guide already got a severe
beating on this and vowed to line in the future.
We drove past the dam a few times to do runs on the higher sections with the obvious...aeh, not gona
run down that one..(and i have done bigger dams previously)...
the floods have created a strong
backwash and people/companies seem to have not
adjusted to it but `spread` the word that `you can do
it`...this accident has shown to better not try it...