$8,000 an hour adds up. PHOTO: SCOTT HENNIGAR


SAFETY BY DOUG SCOTT


Who Pays to Bail Out Kayakers? USER-PAY RESCUE MAY NOT BE AS RATIONAL AS IT SOUNDS


“KAYAKER RESCUED OFF PEI’S NORTH SHORE” was the headline on a CBC story last August. As typically happens, the article ignited heated arguments about who should pay for rescues. High-profile rescues always elicit calls for


user-pay programs by those who argue that “the public should not be burdened with the high cost of rescuing people who undertake high-risk activities.” Kayakers are frequent users of search and


rescue services. Te Halifax Joint Rescue Co- ordination Centre ( JRCC), which coordinates search and rescue for eastern Canadian waters, responded to 33 kayaking incidents from July 1 to the end of October last year. And that’s not including Canada’s other two rescue cen- tres in Victoria and Trenton. Tese search and rescue calls are expensive.


In Canada, dispatching a C-130 Hercules plane to search for a lost kayaker costs between $8,000 and $10,000 per hour; a Cormorant helicopter, $6,000 to $8,000 per hour; and a 52-foot coast guard lifeboat, $500 per day. Te most onerous of the user-pay programs would require the victim to pay the entire cost, which is now covered by taxpayers. User-pay programs are not the simple so-


lution they seem to be, however. Te moun- taineering community has been grappling with this issue for decades. Te American


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Mountain Rescue Association responds that “a charge for rescue often leads to a delay in the call for help.” For sea kayakers to delay a call for assistance would almost certainly result in a higher fatality rate. Another suggestion is to require rescue in-


surance. Again, the American Alpine Club ob- jects, stating that rescue insurance “would dra- matically increase the number, cost and risk of rescue operations because some people might feel entitled, even when it’s not absolutely nec- essary, to cash in on services they feel they have paid for.” Fair and equal access to services is another


issue. It is very hard to justify charging so- called high-risk activities for rescue services that are not levied on other user groups. Some U.S. states have attempted to offset


search and rescue costs through boat regis- tration. Other states have considered this ap- proach and determined that administration costs exceed the revenues. It would seem that user-pay programs are


impractical and that instead we need to ac- cept that maritime search and rescue is sim- ply one more valuable emergency service that the government provides. We can be grateful that the service is available to us, conscious not to abuse it and happy when the headline reads “kayaker rescued” instead of “kayaker’s body recovered.”


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