May 31, 1999

Memorial Day typically marks the beginning of the white-water rafting season in Utah.

But already this year, the season has been marred by a fatality on the Colorado River.

News Specialist Richard Piatt has more on the death and the questions it raises, in this report from Moab.

Along the Colorado River there is unparralleled beauty.

On the river, there is adventure; excitement.

But one Kentucky family found this is no place to let your guard down.

River Guide Tim Angus watched a fatal accident happen.

"It's just amazing the power and the fury of the river. You have to respect every bit of it."

Even experienced river guides know that at high water -- the way the rivers are now -- a good time can quickly go very bad.

The man died on the West Water section of the Colorado. The boiling, fast, cold water leaves no margin for error.

Yet according to guide Tim Angus, who watched the family go into West Water, their inexperience was obvious.

"It's pitiful, really," Angus says. "Because the gentleman didn't need to die. He souldn't have been in West Water Canyon at this high water level, he shouldn't have been in there with his family with no experience."

River guide Shannan Mendoza says, "I don't think anyone had told them exactly what to expect. How to handle themselves. It didn't seem like they knew, or had any idea."

Mendoza was also there, helping pick a lifeless victim from the water.

Word of the death of a tourist spread through Moab like wildfire last week. Everyone wondered: Is anyone to blame?

The family had obtained a permit from the B.L.M. weeks before. They had rented a raft from a local company.

Both agencies believed family knew what it was getting into.

The fact is that whitewater rafting has become so popular that it's virtually impossible to check everyone's experience level. Just this year, the B.L.M. will issue about 12,000 individual permits for the Colorado River, and between 7,000 to 8,000 commercial ones.

Essentially then, the permits and the rangers who check them are tools to limit people's impact on the land and the water, not the other way around.

Bill Stringer of the Bureau of Land Management says, "We have to assume that people who want to and who apply for a westwater permit understand what thye're getting into."

There are requirements for life preservers and other safety equipment that make most trips end on a happy note.

Virginia Tech student Ann Wunderly says, "It brought a big smile on my face when you'd go up the rapid and back down."

By far, most trips do end safely. The chances of trouble are remote, but when it happens that trouble can be tragic.

Unless you have experience on dangerous sections of the river you plan to run, you should think seriously about taking your trip with a professional guide.