I have a westmarine pump and I have had it maybe 5 years it still works great best 29$ I have spent. Buy one even if you think you'll never use it

seriously. I'm very grateful for their presence yesterday.

smart keeping your cool. I know I will be budding up from now on. It just makes since. Hopefully you didn't loose any gear.

Glad you're OK man!

The dangerous irony with these situations is that instinct tells most people to stay on their yak when the smart thing may be to jump in the water. If you have taken on a noticeable amount of water in less than flat conditions. And it has made your yak unstable or very low to the water line. You should probably not open a hatch to pump the water out without getting off. Getting off does several good things for you. It makes your yak more stable by lowering its center of gravity. It raises it in the water line (hopefully above the chop). It allows you to access parts of your yak that you may not be able to reach atop it. And it allows you to position your body to block the swell/chop from washing into the hatch you are pumping out of. Complacency is probably the most dangerous thing for us kayakers. I am guilty of it big time. But having a plan for what to do when the stuff hits the fan can help greatly.

If you keep your hand pump below deck, secure it so it dosent float back out of reach when your hull starts to fill up. Happened to me once. . I just run my ff battery cable through the handle.

I lost a couple things. A plano box of irons. A teramar spinning combo and a gaff. The gaff I'm sure is floating somewhere along the kelp line. The Lost gear was of little concern at the time and is a small price for a valuable lesson. I have a new respect for our ocean and conditions and when this happens again I will know exactly what to do.

Greg that makes perfect sense and at several times I considered it as I was telling jorge. I think you nailed it with mentioning complacency. I really did not want to get in the water. I thought getting to the boat was the best course. First thing I'm doing is gooping my drain plug shut. Then I'm buying a hand pump and mounting it to the underside of my rod pod hatch lid with industrial velcro.

I have a short 5' rope tied to my front handle mount which goes under the front hatch and is ran through my spare paddle and my hand pump. The rope keeps the safety items from sliding out of reach. I can access them through my side hatches or the front hatch. They were one of the first items I bought for my kayak, and hopefully I'll never need them.

When paddling my kayak I sometimes look at the scupper hole by my feet for water level. I know where that water level should be and would start investigating if the water seemed higher than normal. I've always assumed the kayak, if taking on water, would sit level while lowered in the water. Thanks for this report because now I will think about the possibility of the rear sinking lower than the front, which means my habit of looking at the forward scupper for water level monitoring might not work.

This also means that even a bilge pump mounted in the lowest part of the kayak might be ineffective if the kayak sits in an out of level condition when filling with water.

You can bungie a hand pump inside your yak under the cockpit center consul. It will be out of the way and you can forget about it, until the day comes you need it.
I used deck loops for attachments inside, with matching ones backing them on the outside.

Also, it's likely you'd have to jump in the water to pump it out, because you might be riding so low that water will rush in the hatch when you open it.

Glad to hear you made it through without any major losses most importantly your life. Something I was told was never leave the safety of your Kayak if you don't have to. I've read some post saying to get out of the Kayak and install the plug. I think you did it the right way. The getting flipped part, no one could see that one coming. I like Ful-Rac's bilge pump idea and may be doing that also.

Install that drain plug and don't remove it. Also seeing how your in a Moken, do a leak test on your front hatch seal. I know a lot of previous owners of Mokens that had leak issues and they were not minor leaks. Heck everyone should leak test their kayaks. Some leaks are going to happen, but when water fills up like a bath tub, that's not right.

Glad you're O.K. man.

what he does^^^^^


Wind is not your friend on a kayak. I've learned to not like anything above 11 mph.

Dang... I'm a bit iffy about heading out solo after these two post now :( On my check list the first thing is check drain plug and a bit future down is check radio battery.

As tempting as it is at times, I NEVER NEVER go out alone for these exact reasons. Alone inside the harbor sure, outside in the open water NEVER.

Yeah I know the feeling. Keep in mind I have been out alone plenty of times and in conditions almost as bad so never figured it would happen to me and it did. If I go solo it will only be if I see others out and will ask to join them or stay close to shore.

It's not worth it, even for a seabass.

This is what I did with my pump. Beauty of the mod pod is that there are all those structural supports running underneath it. You can drill through those to attach bungee rather than drilling through the hatch itself to attach bungee underneath. Less holes to worry about water entering.

a trick i learned from "Kiyo" (the legend) after having an incident of taking on water and almost sinking a kayak: if your hull fills with water, disconnect your bait tank intake line from the tank and stick the pump into your hull to pump the water out... (of course only that works if you have your pump dragging alongside the kayak) :)

You and that drain plug ....
 

Dude glad your ok! That should definitely be on your checklist.

I know, I know. Seriously it's getting sealed tonight.