Never went into rapids, but I went into a beach between caribean sea and atlantic ocean, known for having a bit more waves (nothing like a class V rapid, maybe 1m waves max.). I failed to catch one at the right time and got swallowed into the crashing tube, it was hard to describe how being embedded in a fluid with enough internal energy feels.
Between the chaotic directions and the actual strength I turned into a wooden puppet. I ended up eating the sand face first while my heel knocked my head from behind. Something I cannot do on my own, its just the wave that folded me backward. I'm lucky I didn't breath water I'd have finished that day in a hospital or worse.
I was on the barren craggy side of Aruba with my wife standing on this sheer “cliff” about 15 feet above the ocean watching these big waves roll in.
All of a sudden a wave about 20 feet appeared out of nowhere and almost swept us off the cliff.
I was recording a video of the waves. We looked back at the video later and you hear me go “oh shit”, pick up my wife, and run just to get pummeled by this thing from behind with water splashing over us. We got pretty far from the cliff and I’m not positive how much of it was running verse being pushed.
The end of the video is us soaked cracking up with broken flips flops and me saying “my phone got wet”. We absolutely don’t remember any of it. It was pure adrenaline the second we saw the wave.
I did something similar in Nice. Standing a little inshore, the top of the water hitting my torso was moving faster than the water around my legs. I ended up being flipped backwards, and dumped on the floor with my back bent right back. I was lucky the tide wasn't stronger, it was hard enough swimming back to shore with my back hurt as it was.
Right, it's crazy how water can bend your body that much. I guess every part in the wave carry enough force to keep bending you in every angle. I also had pain in my spine for a while. I'm everything but supple.
You're right, when something pushes you you can usually swerve or redirect the motion. When the water hits you, even the water moving around you pins you in place, and the water behind sucks you in the same direction - it's impossible to pivot without gravity!
I have a healthy fear of standing up in the ocean now...
Yep, and it's a very unnatural situation to be in, maybe people used to skyfall have better reflexes to stop spinning and getting a sense of orientation back.
