A father and son are lucky to have been rescued after their boat struck rocks on the Columbia River after dark.
Ootischenia resident Tyler Gienger said he was fishing off his dock around 9:30 p.m. Friday when a friend from the Robson fire department phoned to let him know a boat flipped over by the Kinnaird bridge and could be headed his way.
Gienger got into his boat with a friend and went looking. He spotted a flashlight beam on the opposite side of the river, which turned out to be a police officer also looking for the boat in distress. He told Gienger it had happened 20 to 25 minutes earlier.
“We thought by that time they more than likely have floated by us but I thought just in case they caught a back eddy, I would head upstream,” Gienger said.
“Sure enough, I saw a flashlight on the other side of the river, on my side, closer to the bridge. Turned out they were on the shore clinging to their boat, trying to hold it there while making some phone calls.
“We ended up coming up beside them, holding their boat for them, and getting them in our boat. They were freezing.”
Gienger said the pair told him they were going upstream when they hit some rocks and became high-centred. They got out and tried to dislodge the boat, but the current caught it and pulled it over.
“They were able to hold on and drift downstream. They actually went a fair ways from the bridge. They were probably in between my house and Waterloo Eddy.”
Gienger and his friend tied up the damaged boat, phoned his friend to let them know the pair was safe, and returned them to his place, where police and paramedics were waiting.
“They were shaken up and cold, but ultimately uninjured and safe, so they got really lucky,” Gienger added, noting they were not wearing lifejackets.
Gienger said they gave the pair warm clothes and got them warmed up. The next morning they returned to tow the boat back to the launch. The boat’s steering column and the top of its outboard engine were both ripped off.
