Navigating ANY Canal Lock Without Sinking - VERY IMPORTANT 😰 Narrowboat life

My name is Daniel and I'm here at a canal lock to highlight a big danger, which can catch you off guard so easily spell disaster within minutes
I have been around the canal for over 10 years and hear about 1 boat per year just in my area of Bath UK that gets caught out like this and results in the boat sinking.
This will completely ruin your holiday or home if you are a livaboard boater.
It also blocks off the canal as recovery can take upto a week before a crane can be organised to lift the boat out.It is such an easy mistake to make, yet so easily avoided.
I will show you in this video how. The lock is full of water and we are going downhill.
I have just opened the paddles at the far end to let the water out and drain the lock. For the purpose of this demonstration there is no boat so you can clearly see what the danger is
As the water level drops a concrete cill reveals its ugly face.
This danger is not obvious at first as it is submerged under the water and sits level with the bottom of the canal. There is nothing that can be done about this, it needs to be there as we are dropping down lower to get the level change in the canal, which cuts through gradients in the landscape. As you can see on the video the concrete cill is just becoming obvious now. Your boat will need to be on the other side of the cill marker to stay safe.
You can see how quickly the concrete starts to protrude above the water level and if you think how heavy a metal narrowboat actually is, once its resting on here, its almost impossible to push it off using manpower,
Once the back of the boat starts to lif out of the water, you can imagine the panic that sets in for the skipper of the vessel, as the water continue to drop, but by this stage it is already too late,
We are talking a matter of seconds, not minutes for this to unfold. Also the sounds of the water flowing make it very difficult for anyone operating the paddles on the lock gates to hear any cries from the skipper on the back of the boat, If the person operating the the lock gate is inexperienced they may not realise to close the paddles quickly and then run to the opposite side to open the paddles to let the water back into the lock, this will avert disaster, but as mentioned it all happens very quickly.
As the back of the boat continues to rise, it pushes the front down and the boat slips under the water like a dart, creating a complete mess for all users of the canal as the now sunken boat is blocking the wayl until it gets recovered.
So always be aware of the concrete cill hidden out of sight and out of mind.
This is a very costly error and is guaranteed to ruin your holiday and could be a write off for your home. With this danger in mind you can now enjoy your holiday or save a packet on repairs if it is your own boat.

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