Short-lived water-rescue callout at Lincoln Park

Just in case you saw/heard the responding units and wondered – there was a short-lived “water rescue response” at Lincoln Park about half an hour ago. Turned out that a windsurfer reported as being in trouble, wasn’t.

flimflam December 18, 2022 (10:45 am)

This seems to happen a lot. Good that there’s a quick response but I wonder what people think they’re seeing vs what is actually happening?

Wingfoiler December 18, 2022 (6:41 pm)

Hi – I was one of the wing foil guys out early this morning so I am guessing this was called on one of us. I appreciate folks’ concern for us and also want to provide some context for those watching from the shore who are wondering whether or not they should call for a rescue. It is totally normal and expected to see us fall in the water. I fall in every couple minutes when trying to turn or surf the chop. We dress appropriately for this expectation: thermal layers, dry suit, pfd. Many of us also wear helmets in case we bonk ourselves on the board. What this means is that I may be in the water for a minute or even a few and am completely comfortable. I may even just be taking a breather for a second before getting back on the board. My recommendation, and other wind riders may have different thoughts, is to watch for two situations: first if someone is in the water (not on their board) and not moving at all for more than a three or four minutes (I’d worry someone got knocked out or had a med emergency) and second if someone is clearly making a distress signal by waving their arms above their head and facing towards shore. Otherwise, we are generally speaking in a non emergency situation. We may have lost gear and need to paddle back to shore or the wind dies and we have to slowly get back to shore somehow, but we are not in danger in these situations. We consider tides and wind direction before going out. This means we only go when we expect the wind to help us get back to shore if we have trouble for some reason. If we end up somewhere along the shoreline that isn’t where we expected, many of us carry our phones to call for a ride. In any case, I hope this context helps – we appreciate your concern and interest. Feel free to say hi to us on the beach if you have any questions.