make maximum wind, waves, and current required fields for Sea Kayaking activities
Sea Kayaking activities have fields for maximum wind, waves, and current. Currently these are optional. Because they are optional, some leaders do not fill them in. This omits critical information about how difficult a trip may be. Leaders should think about and enter specific values for each these. Making them required will enforce good practice.
At the 2025 Sea Kayak Summit, we voted to make these fields required, if it was technically possible. This is the request to do so.
Tom Unger
shared this idea
Hello All -
I see here that this idea was voted/agreed upon during the Kayak Summit so will proceed with exploring how we can meet the need! We do not currently have a way of setting certain fields within an activity to be required for some activity types versus others. This type of logic would have to be build and hardcoded which would require development hours now and each time it changed. I am hesitant to build this complexity into our current process as it could be difficult to manage if we build similar functionality for each activity type. That said, I do think there are smaller development changes that we could do that would highlight when Kayak leaders do not follow the guidelines set by the committee for trip postings. Would the committee be open to exploring how we could use automated email notifications that would email the primary leader if fields deemed required were missing and then escalate the trip to committee leadership if not corrected within X days? This would provide greater flexibility in changing what fields are required by the committee in the future.
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Felicia Wibowo
commented
Besides Sea kayak and now packraft activity, which other activity is using wind, waves and current? Way back when the the website (currently in used) was in design phase, wind, wave and current fields was added because of sea kayak rating has these elements. Could we have a list of other activity who uses these fields?
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Tom Unger
commented
Thank you for offering a solution. This was noted on base camp but no one expressed a significant opinion about it.
My opinion is that we’ll not follow up on this. Making these required fields is the right technological solution. But, I understand that sometimes software is built in such a way that some solutions are just very difficult.
I don’t like the solution of sending an e-mail if a required field was not filled in. It is an awkward workaround, requiring extra effort. Similarly, the committee does not have the resources to follow up on fields not filled in.
Filling these three fields is not that important. It is an effort to capture what the maximum conditions are for a trip. These three components are importantly, but don’t capture all possible conditions.
Does Max Wind mean max sustained wind or max gusts. Leaders have different interpretations. Maybe there should be a field for each.
There is a big difference between paddling into a wind and running downwind with it. I have different maximums for each.
And then there are minimum temperatures, maximum rainfall, and other conditions that would cause me to cancel a trip. These cannot be captured by a few fields. Really, leaders should write a short section describing maximum conditions / what will cancel this trip.
Making those three fields required was a small step toward that solution. But fields will never capture a full statement of max conditions. Leaders can put those in the notes when appropriate.
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Lori Porter Stole
commented
I always fill those fields in. It's important to relay what max conditions the participants should be able to paddle in, and in what conditions you need to call the trip. The SK ratings don't necessarily provide that number, and in some postings are not correctly selected (a lower current or wind is allowed by the selected SK rating than the max current/wind numbers that are posted.
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David Stolier
commented
I view the SK rating as a conveyer of general information and always look to the wind/wave/current maximums for more specific information about where the thresholds are for a go/no go decision. For example, if a newer paddler is unsure whether they are ready to go on an SK III trip, a max wind and waves will give them additional information to help with that decision. They may register if max wind is 7 and current at 1 kn, but not with wind at 10 and current at 2kn. Also, not everyone has the SK rating memorized and the specific wind/wave/current is very concrete at a glance. I'ver never not filled it in.
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Michael Everett
commented
We (all chapters) also agreed to have a single (highest) sk rating for each paddle. The reasoning behind the induvidual levels being stated is someone might feel comfortable in an sk IV for current, but not for wind or wave height. This will better describe the expected conditions.
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Charlie Michel
commented
Good idea. I always list these personally, and if they are not in congruence with the SK ratiing, then it tells me my rating was incorrect, and I revise it. It forces one to think about what are the limits. It did help being at the Summit and hearing the conversation to reinforce why we all thought this is a good idea.
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Joel Guay
commented
Great idea. Also maybe code the site to allow only one numeric value for the SK rating?
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Ron Jones
commented
I do not like the idea of adding “required” fields for wind, waves and currents. That is covered in the SK rating system already. It could also be covered in the leader notes about the trip.
By making these mandatory it has the potential to result in conflicting information between the Sk rating and the feild entry if leaders are not careful.
Moreover it might drive leaders to overrating trips to ensure they don’t have to be cancelled. In theory, at least at one time, we always had the philosophy that if the conditions exceeded the Sk rating the best practice was to cancel or move to plan b plan c. Etc.
I don’t see any value in adding these fields as required.
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Felicia Wibowo
commented
The wind, waves and current is important for participants who like to join the trip and evaluate him/herself whether they are within his/her skill level.