Gallery Hippo and the high cost of freesurfing

In: Swellnet Sessions Photographer Ray Collins Sun 8th Jan '12

Tags: ryan hipwood , Laurie Towner , Mark Mathews , richie vas , ray collins

In my experience as a surf photographer I've learn't some important lessons. One is, don't make long term plans or commit to anything too far away, as weather systems, swells and wind can change by the hour. And two, when your gut feeling tells you to do something, you do it.

I got a call from Mark Mathews late on a Thursday night not so long ago asking me if I was interested in coming to WA for a swell. He was leaving in a matter of hours.

Now, this is where lesson one meets lesson two: my timetable full of (real world) work commitments weighing in against my gut feeling. When I weigh up big decisions I usually rate them on a scale - 'Will this decision have a negative effect on me? Today? This week? In six months?'

I told him I would see him at the airport.

I have always been fascinated by this wave and with a crew consisting of the who's who of young Aussie maniacs (Mathews, Vas, Hipwood, Towner plus core locals and crazy bodyboarders). The scene was set.

I knew a few things. I knew the swell was estimated to be a thick, beautiful and backless 15-20ft. And I also knew the men who ride this wave don't let fear hold them back. I didn't know, however, that I would watch someone come seconds away to losing their life.

Ryan Hipwood is no stranger to the surfing public. You've seen him acid dropping at stepped out Shipsterns, paddling into cartoonish avalanches in Fiji and being casually victorious in whatever Teahupo'o has challenged him with. And thats only the last 12 months of chasing purple weather blobs.

As these photos will attest - Yin cannot exist without Yang.

As Laurie steered Ryan into this mountainous lump I can vividly recall the moment he deemed it no longer necessary for motorised assistance. First a speed burn/half stall, then he reset his line to thread through the steely blue cathedral, but due to a combination of period, tide and direction the walls were set to come crashing down in, on and all around him.

'Get Fucked!'

When the screams and hoots from the crowd tapered away, they then bled into an eery silence... It had been well over thirty seconds from the deafening explosion and we still hadn't seen Hippo. It became suddenly clear that the situation was now dire.

I had a hundred thoughts racing through my mind: 'Breathing Enhancement Training?', 'Buoyancy vest?', 'Unconscious?'

A limp, semi motionless black figure popped into my field of vision, around 120 metres from where the gates of Hades slammed shut on him. Within an instant Laurie was by his side, with one hand on the throttle and the other on the scruff of Ryan's neck he pulled him up and into a prayer like kneel on the back of the ski. Thank God there wasn't another wave in this instance or this written piece would undoubtably be his eulogy. Although I felt hopeless by way of helping, all I could do was the very thing I was being paid to do - document. So I clicked away as the colour in his eyes returned and as the piercing, stinging breaths burnt life back into his lungs. He would later go on to tell us that on his sixth oxygen burning attempt to make it to the surface he gave up. He stood at the door to the afterlife, one hand on the handle before finally being floated up in an air pocket to the surface.

So next time you're thumbing through a magazine and you see Hippo in a thick tropical drainpipe, casual as you like. Think of the sacrifices and close calls it took him to be in that spot, in that moment. And then be grateful you're not a freesurfer. //RAY COLLINS