Molly AK Connors
Concord Monitor
CONCORD, N.H. — Three teenagers were hypothermic but otherwise unharmed after they were knocked out of their kayaks on the Blackwater River on Monday night.
“They should’ve never been in the river,” Franklin Deputy fire Chief Kevin LaChapelle said.
Two emergency trucks, three boats and 13 swift water rescue technicians were required in the rescue, which occurred after dark, according to the Franklin Fire Department.
The names of the kayakers - two females and a male - were not available, and it was not clear how many boats they were paddling.
They launched around dusk, LaChapelle said, but it was dark when the strong river currents dislodged them from their kayaks.
“Their kayaks were swept away, and then they were swept away,” he said.
The boy made it to shore and the two girls washed up on an island upstream from the Cilleyville Bridge, LaChapelle said.
“The male victim had made two attempts to make a rescue of the girls, and when he was not successful at that, he went and called for help,” LaChapelle said.
The Andover Fire Department arrived first, he said, and members of the Three Rivers WET Team followed a short time later.
To get the teenagers off the island, rescuers set up ropes and pulleys across the river and then hooked up a system of rescue boats to cross the water to the island.
The rescue took about an hour, LaChapelle said, and rescuers were at the scene for about two hours.
The teenagers were treated for hypothermia and released at the scene, he said.
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