My boat has two Captains that switch back and forth, I am 6'0 210, the other Captain is 5'9 140. Anyone who regularly Captains a driftboat can see what is coming from here…

I thought I was doing everything right…I scouted the float the day before from the bank identifying the tricky spots and picking my lines prior to floating. The river had changed drastically from the last time I had floated so I asked around to see if there were any dangerous spots that I could not identify and got the all clear.

Saturday morning: River perfect, first one to the launch (Guide still sleeping 100 yards away), bright, bright moonlight enough to allow me to put some distance between ourselves and the sleeping guide while still dark. As I did so I noticed that the boat was acting a little sluggishly but wrote it off to slightly heavier than normal flows…oops!!!

As it got light I started over a shallow riffle that poured into a deep hole headed by a log jam which I had identified as a potential problem, two-thirds of the river poured behind the jam creating a nasty hydraulic, the other third flowed on down river. I could not slow my momentum before entering the riffle because of the sluggishness of the boat and as I hit the deep area where I could get an oarstroke I had both oars buried in the water and all 210 muscular pounds pulling back on the oars and I still could not stop the boat!! Fortunately I have been in this situation before, I pointed the bow of the boat right at the 'knuckle' created by the hydraulic which acts as a bit of hill or brake. Unfortunately in the past when I have used this trick my boat was trimmed out for one Captain. In this instance I was sucked in to the hydraulic behind the log jam, which was spinning much like bathwater leaving the tub.

Obviously too much of the ass of my boat was in the water which caused this entire problem. I failed to properly trim my boat and it almost cost me and my passengers our lives!

I am a big strong dude but I have never been as scared in my whole life then I was in that moment I was pulling back on the oars with every ounce of strength in my body to no effect!!

This brings up several topics I would Love to openly discuss on this board:

1. Have you ever been in a situation like this yourself (stuck in a hydraulic, behind a log jam) and what did you do to get out of it?

I tried to keep the nose of the boat pointed right at the danger until the hydraulic took control of the boat and started spinning us, I used a powerstroke in the current rushing by to spin the boat out of the hydraulic, unfortunately this maneuver pinned me to the log jam a little further down, we had to high side twice to keep from going over!!

2. All drift boat Captains know how critical left/right balance is to maintaining maneuverability, I haven't heard front to back balance discussed quite as much. If I could geta cross section of ideas about bow/stern balance I would appreciate it. Is there an easy way to determine if the boat is balanced properly bow to stern while sitting in the oarsmen seat?? Does anyone else have a boat that is frequently captained by more than one person and if so how do you ensure proper balance after changing Captains??

3. When is it time to abandon ship??

Thanks for your input on these questions in advance