High Winds Send 1,500 Rafters Adrift to Canada

Canadian officials rescued about 1,500 people Sunday after strong westerly winds whipped their inflatable rafts off course during an annual float trip on the St. Clair River between Michigan and Ontario and sent them across the border, according to media reports.

Authorities think all of the 5,000 people who participated in the 7.5-mile Port Huron Float Down have been accounted for after chaos ensued with the sudden change in the weather following a clear start to the day. Some didn’t have life jackets, and that added to the chaos, authorities said.

Sarnia Police Sgt. Scott Clark told WWJ Radio that 19 busloads of people were shipped back to the United States from temporary refugee camps set up on the Canadian side of the river.

U.S. Coast Guard Lt. Ben Chamberlain said Monday that everyone has been accounted for and no lives were lost. The Coast Guard saved about 40 people from drowning and assisted 125 more who were unable to get back to shore under their own power.

“No lives lost,” Chamberlain told the Port Huron Times Herald. “We had a few people who got separated from their parties, but as of (Monday) everyone is accounted for.”

Port Huron Police Sgt. Jason Barna told the Times Herald that authorities scrambled after the winds kicked up under the pressure leading to not only medical calls, reports of possible drownings and people falling off rafts, but also complaints of people getting out of the river on private land and trying to hitchhike to their cars.

The St. Clair River is an international shipping channel, and both the Canadian Shipowners Association and the U.S. Lake Carriers’ Association issued a joint statement earlier this month urging that the Port Huron Float Down be nixed for good. It occurs “at the height of the shipping season,” the groups said, and endangers participants and slows commercial operations.

“The Port Huron Float Down is neither carefully planned nor adequately supervised, and when coupled with the expected consumption of alcohol, this is an invitation to disaster,” Lake Carriers’ Association President James Weakley said in the statement.

“The fast-running and chilly waters of the St. Clair River between Port Huron and Marysville are a federal navigation channel, not a playground.”

However, Erik Kimball, owner of the Port Huron Float Down website and a past event organizer, told the Times Herald the “waterways are for everybody.”

The U.S. Coast Guard shuts down the river between Lighthouse Beach in Port Huron and Chrysler Beach in Marysville for the event.

“This is nothing new or unusual for them,” Kimball told the newspaper.

Multiple agencies responded to the hectic situation Sunday, according to a news release from Sarnia Police, who were assisted in the rescue effort by the Sarnia Fire Department, Lambton EMS, Ontario Provincial Police, Canada Customs and Border Agency, RCMP and Canada Coastguard water units, Sarnia Transit, Canadian Red Cross, security and fire personnel from the various chemical and petrochemical plants that border the St. Clair River, and members of the general public.

Image: 2013 Float Down photo by kristy via Flickr / Creative Commns