The water's turquoise hues draw you in, misty and cool, its icy fingers reaching for your toes, and you give in to the allure. Lake Superior can be mesmerizing, but underneath its surface lies a realm of danger disguised as beauty.
Cari Mews will never forget that feeling of danger, as she was the lone survivor of a kayaking incident that took the lives of her husband and three young children. After interviewing a U.S. Coast Guard member who was a first responder on the search and rescue team of September 2nd, I learned shocking details of the daily life and the mindset of the crew responsible for maintaining the wellbeing of those who take on the water.
Bailey Rose is an active member of the Coast Guard, and at the time of the incident, was stationed on Lake Superior in Bayfield, Wisconsin. He described the moments before the call as a normal day of "smokin' and jokin'" with his buddies in the station, and as soon as the alarm went off alerting the crew of the crisis, the atmosphere shifted. "It's difficult to explain if you're not experiencing it, but this is what we train for. We train every single day for a moment like this," he told me in a candid conversation about the rescue mission. Once that alarm blared, though, that seemingly normal day turned into 12 hours of searching for the victims, dead or alive.
Luckily, Mews sealed her cell phone in a plastic bag to prepare for the trip. She was able to send a text message to her sister after her kayak capsized miles away from the shore of Michigan Island. However, the message was unable to reach her sister's phone until five hours after it was sent because of the poor cell reception in the water. By then, Mews had lost sight of her family, and that phone became her lifeline. She was found by another crew around 10pm, clutching the light of her cell phone in complete darkness.
"She was lucky to have that phone," explained Rose. "This is a perfect example of why the Coast Guard does boardings of water vehicles as a standard procedure. Without the proper equipment, what happened to this family could be just as deadly for anyone else." This is where he mentioned the motto 'Semper Paratus.' It means 'always ready,' and that is what the U.S. Coast Guard advises all individuals to be when taking on any body of water.
All four of the victims were found face down in the water, wearing lifejackets. You can never be too prepared when on a body of water such as Lake Superior. With frigid temperatures and the vast area the water spans across, when the sun sets, hypothermia is inevitable, and search and rescue teams have a much more difficult time trying to find someone without the light of a nearby city. Your fate is in the hands of a small crew and based on the premise of hope if traveling without enough rescue equipment. The Coast Guard's motto is not just for them to follow, but it is for water-goers to live by. "They need to be able to help themselves," stated Rose.
Note: Bailey Rose is not an official source of information on the situation. He was a member of the search and rescue team as well as an observer. He is not liable for any information published, as he is not a primary source and is just speaking of his own experiences. All factual information about the case was taken from https://www.cnn.com/2018/09/02/us/wisconsin-family-kayaking-trnd/index.html.
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