Call me jaded. Maybe this is my “old man yells at clouds” moment for August.
Seeing first-hand a portion of the Port Huron Float Down event held on the St. Clair River recently, I can’t help but think of how many tax dollars were spent – on both sides of the border – to protect people from themselves.
Every year people get together for the event, which is unsanctioned, and hop in the water in Port Huron and Sarnia on inflatable rafts and such, and let the current take them down the river about a dozen kilometres.
In past years, as many as 4,000 people took part. This time around, the number was in the hundreds.
My wife Mary Beth and I took a drive to Sarnia for some fries under the Bluewater Bridge, and enjoyed the scenic route up the river and back to get there. Naturally, a stop at the Sugar Shack in Wallaceburg for some dole whip in a waffle corn was in order.
But I digress. I found a perfect parking spot under the bridge at Waterfront Park in Sarnia. We grabbed some fries and a hot dog from Archie’s, the chip truck there, and enjoyed the view.
The current and the wind were very strong that day. Sheriff’s vessels, border services boats and the OPP’s boat all had to remain in gear to just stay in place as floating folks went by.
To think that the authorities shut down this stretch of the St. Clair River to commercial and pleasure boat traffic for about seven hours for this event is ludicrous.
It’s unsanctioned.
And it is an event police say is very dangerous, given the currents and the fact a good portion of participants are boozing it up.
It was pretty clear the authorities were trying to keep folks on their respective sides of the river. They did not want a repeat of something that happened in the past where winds blew about 1,500 U.S. floaters onto the Canadian shoreline, most, if not all, without any identification.
Had that happened this time around, I would have loved to see them rounded up and treated in the same manner that the U.S. is currently treating illegal immigrants (and a hell of a lot of legal immigrants and even U.S. citizens, actually). Lock them up without traditional rights.
A taste of their own medicine; a whiff of what they voted for.
On our side of the border, members of the Canadian Border Services, RCMP, OPP, Sarnia Police Service, Sarnia Fire Rescue, and Lambton EMS were all involved that day.
Some folks will say these floaters should be able to do what they want. It’s their choice. Well, what about forcing the closure of the river to commercial and pleasure boater traffic. Is it the choice of a freighter captain to not use this vital passage? Or for a family to go boating on a Sunday afternoon?
Or do we just let it all happen in chaos and watch floaters get sucked into the wash of a 1,000-foot-long freighter?
