The Nechako Float will not ride the waves this weekend - the river is too high and fast for the original Saturday launch plan.
Instead it has been rescheduled to August, according to the event Facebook page.
"After contacting the City Of Prince George, it has been decided that due to the weather conditions of the past several months, we cannot in good conscience recommend floating this Saturday," stated organizers.
"It is recommended that floaters wait until mid-August to take to the river so, we shall be moving the official date of Prince George's third annual huge river float... allowing ample time for the flooding to subside, and the water to warm up."
The annual event gathers hundreds of people to push off into the Nechako River for a lazy float down the city's large tributary of the Fraser River. It is rescheduled for Aug. 20.
"I have to give credit to the organizers for that," said Prince George RCMP spokesman Cpl. Craig Douglass. "It is too fast and too cold for anyone to be out on the river on a flotation devise."
Police, Prince George Fire Rescue Service, Prince George Search and Rescue, the Prince George Jet Boat Association and many other partners are involved in river safety on an ongoing basis, and have to pay special attention when the Nechako River Float happens.
"We have a plan. It involves overtime, it involves auxiliary members, partnerships with other safety agencies, it involves the shoreline, the water, the road, wherever we feel someone is posing a risk to others or themselves," Douglass said.
He said a number of injuries and a number of cases of hypothermia resulted from last year's event, which would only be compounded in this year's unusual conditions. Even in August it might be worse than the 2010 edition, but there are four more weeks for these high-risk conditions to improve.
The scheduled after-party on Saturday night at The Generator has not been postponed. It is now being called a pre-party.
NECHAKO RISKS - THE CURRENT CONDITIONS
Fire department Capt. Larry Obst is a technical rescue instructor. He trains swiftwater rescue personnel in the Nechako River waters when ice blocks float past and the air bites the skin with frost. He said the current conditions may as well be winter for the effects it would have on someone tubing down the current.
"Cold water is considered anything less than 20 degrees Celsius and right now it is closer to 10 or 12 degrees," said Obst.
"If you were outside in temperatures of 10 or 12 degrees you would get cold at a certain rate, but if you are floating along in the water you wold lose heat 25 times faster. If you were stationary in the water, it happens up to 250 times faster. It is just like windchill. Hypothermia is a real concern for that water right now."
The dangers are so numerous, he said, he couldn't even list them all.
"It is cold, it is powerful, it is relentless," he said, summarizing the river's main hazards.
All these issues are omnipresent but the unseasonably cold and flooded conditions have upped the ante.
Some of the main ones include more debris than usual, and it is moving faster; more unseen objects just below the surface that would normally be visible this time of year, more shoreline roots and snags to get caught on; stationary obstacles like bridge pilings or log jams have exponentially higher water pressure pushing past them.
"If you become pinned, it is so powerful that you are held in that spot, and then the hypothermia factor ramps up," he said, then added a chilling secondary factor. "If someone gets into trouble, it is tougher to get access to them. Rescuers have to take precautions about getting trapped themselves."
He also warned against tying flotation devises together into a raft. It increases the chances of getting excess rope snagged, or getting wrapped around a stationary object, or someone getting a limb caught in a rope, and less maneuverability.
"It puts the people on board in much more and very significant danger," he said.
If someone does get into trouble, he said, the most import thing to provide them with is a flotation device, even if they have a life jacket on.
An empty (capped) 2-litre pop bottle, a cooler, a boat's gas can, a soccer ball, all these can make a good emergency tool.
Obst's observations of the river indicate most people are aware of the river's problems. He has seen plenty of boats, but minimal floaters.
No matter what method you use on the river, he said, there is absolutely no excuse for going without a personal flotation device properly worn at all times.
