Moment Kayak Angler Capsizes At Sea Caught On Camera

Sean Lawless was kayak fishing in a tournament near Pompano, Florida on a dark and stormy morning when he experienced one of the scariest moments in kayak fishing caught on camera. Lawless would go on to describe the situation as “one of the most harrowing experiences of my life.”

A dark and stormy morning near Pompano, Florida

The morning began with a Coast Guard inspection of all the competitors’ kayaks for essential safety gear including lifejackets, sound producing devices to signal for help, and a visual distress symbol (flag) before a surf launch at 6:45 a.m.

“It’s looking pretty sporty out there right now,” said Lawless in the video.

It took about two and a half hours of fishing for Lawless to get his first bite, and with a tangled line Lawless was off to a rocky start. Lawless had caught two king mackerels and was keeping an eye on radar as the weather continued to look ominous, noting that there was a building storm cell to the south, but it had been forecasted to dissipate.

“Well, it didn’t dissipate,” narrated Lawless. “It just got bigger and stronger. Looking at the radar now I decided it’s time to pack up and head in.”

As Lawless began trolling toward shore, conditions began to deteriorate.

“The plan was to troll all the way in to give me a chance to get that third king mackerel and at least maybe a chance to place. But all that changed when I felt this big swell come up from behind, and I decided no more trolling, let’s get in,” narrated Lawless as the video showed the large swell rolling underneath him.

Caught in a storm at sea

In the span of about two minutes, the weather went from somewhat ominous and threatening to whitecaps, wind and rollers.

“I was a little over two miles out when I decided to head in, so by this point I’d made it maybe a quarter of a mile. This is where everything started to unravel,” said Lawless.

Lawless was hit with a wave, and his kayak slapped the surface of the water—the force of it breaking the back right-hand side arm of his seat.

“Now I’m in big trouble because I cannot sit straight up and balance,” explained Lawless. “In case you were wondering, I am wearing a lifejacket,” he added. “It’s an auto-inflate around my waist.”

Big swells built from behind Lawless, muddled further with cross swell from the wind. It was around this time that Lawless changed his goal from getting back to shore to weigh his fish to simply getting back to shore alive.

“You really get an idea of the wind speed here when you see the spray from the kayak go completely sideways through the air,” narrated Lawless just as over the VHF marine radio a muffled voice said, “Get your butt in”.

Open water capsize in a storm

It was shortly after the urgent message sounded over the radio that it happened. With his center of gravity off from his broken seat, Lawless had a wave hit at just the wrong angle and found himself in the water.

Luckily, Lawless had practiced self-rescues many times and successfully and quickly recovered by crawling back into the kayak and keeping his body low.

“I did lose two vital things that I didn’t notice because of the chaos,” explained Laweless. One of these items was his bag of fish. The other item, arguably one of the most important pieces of safety gear Lawless had on his person, Lawless wouldn’t realize was missing until later.

Lawless was now over a mile from shore.

“It just felt like every thirty seconds the swells were getting bigger and the wind was getting stronger,” narrated Lawless.

Lawless continued to lean into the swells to keep from capsizing, but before long another swell from the side threw Lawless off balance and back into the water.

A second capsize in worsening conditions

Now in the water a second time, Lawless quickly flipped his kayak using the fins and his knees as leverage and again scrambled back onto his kayak, successfully self-rescuing.

It was at this point that Lawless realized he had lost his VHF marine radio, which would have allowed him to call nearby vessels for assistance. Lawless had removed the tether, which he had earlier found to be too short to hold the radio to his mouth to communicate.

“At this point, this is the first time that I’ve been on the water and I’ve actually been scared and worried that I wasn’t going to make it back to shore,” said Lawless.

The weather continued to deteriorate as the waves and wind increased and visibility decreased.

“My stamina was waning. I was exhausted from the constant pedaling and having to flip the kayak. The only thought in my head was ‘please don’t flip again,’ but it was inevitable.”

Lawless leaned his weight into a wave, but ultimately he capsized a third time. Lawless had a paddle on board which could provide additional stability and help brace into the waves, but he did not use it. The wind caught the kayak and flipped it, and Lawless began his third self-rescue.

Now exhausted, Lawless begins a third self-rescue

Exhausted from pedaling his kayak in worsening conditions and multiple self-rescue attempts, Lawless’s third attempt was initially successful, but before he could regain his balance another wave sent him back into the water.

“I was just about to the point that I was going to activate my inflatable life vest,” said Lawless before his fourth self-rescue. In this fourth rescue, Lawless successfully reentered the kayak a third time.

Now sitting on his kayak, a motorized fishing boat passed in front of Lawless. He waved for help, but the attempt went unseen.

“In my extreme state of exhaustion I forgot about my airhorn that I had to signal them,” shared Lawless. “At this point it became clear to me that it was going to be 100% up to me to get back to shore.”

With relentless pedaling, Lawless made it back to the beach. He was the second to last kayak angler in the tournament to return.

“I learned several lessons that day,” shared Lawless in the conclusion of the video. “I should have never untethered my radio. Those portable radios, when they get water and splashed you gotta hold them right up next to your mouth to talk so anybody can hear you.. So I need to get a longer tether.”