15 Dumped in Drink at Disneyland : Mishap: No one is injured, but it was ‘total chaos’ as canoe sank. Patrons blame overloading, but park officials cite splashing and rocking by riders.

At first, the water coming in over the canoe’s gunwales seemed part of the fun to Patricia Camara and her friends during a canoe ride at Disneyland.

But Camara, 22, and her friends quickly found themselves frantically swimming to safety after their Frontierland canoe sank Tuesday with 15 people aboard.

“There was total chaos going on,” she said. “It was comical because they kept saying, ‘It won’t sink, keep paddling,’ and it sank right there.”

Terry Pirtle, 22, who was with Camara and five other co-workers from San Jose on a visit to the amusement park, said that just before the accident, their canoe and another one were racing. That’s when their canoe began to list, he said.

“It’s unreal what happened,” Pirtle said. “I think it snowballed--seriously snowballed--and there was no one there to say, ‘Hey, let’s put some rationale into this thing.’ ”

Ralph J. Helm, a police officer from Chicago who was visiting the park with relatives and photographed the incident, said the canoe “was definitely overloaded.”

Tempers flared, but no one was injured. However, one rider who screamed for help had to be rescued by a park employee because she could not swim, Bob Roth, a Disneyland spokesman, said.

None of the canoe riders were wearing a life preserver. Roth said life preservers are kept aboard each canoe and could be passed out by operators if they felt that they were necessary. A spokesman for the U.S. Coast Guard said a federal requirement that all boats must carry flotation devices does not apply on private waterways, including those in amusement parks.

Roth acknowledged that the accident angered some of the canoe riders who lost jewelry or had belongings damaged in the dunking. But he said the ride operators aboard the canoe did not cause the accident by either racing or overloading the boat.

“There were some heavy people in the canoe. But some younger people in their early 20s contributed to the problem by splashing and tipping the canoe,” Roth said.

He said they ignored the ride operators’ warnings and the canoe sank.

Roth said 15 people were in the canoe, which is part of a ride known as Davy Crockett’s Explorer Canoes. The ride is regarded as one of the more popular attractions because participants paddle the canoes themselves. Each canoe has two ride operators, one of whom steers the boat.

Roth said the incident occurred about 5:15 p.m. near the end of the ride. He estimated the depth of the man-made waterway from four to eight feet deep. He said the canoe sank in a section about four feet deep.

However, Pirtle, who is 6-foot-3, said he had trouble touching the bottom when he tried to wade to shore, a distance of about 10 feet.

Pirtle and Camara said they are upset because they believe that the accident could have been avoided by the ride operators who encouraged passengers to paddle faster. Although no one was injured, the accident could have been serious, they said.

Passengers were taken to a first-aid station to dry off, Roth said.

Camara wants the park to refund her money and replace her watch, which she said was damaged. Pirtle wants reimbursement for his camera, watch and clothes. In addition, he said, he lost his keys in the lake, but park employees later found them.

Roth said the park is accepting any claims for damaged or lost property.

He pointed out that canoe riders, especially young adults, enjoy challenging people in other canoes to race.

“In the spirit of fun, our operators allow that sort of thing, but obviously not at the expense of safety,” Roth said.

In this instance, Roth said, “accounts differ.”

“The operators warned people not to rock or splash so much while they were in the boats,” he said.

Roth said he did not know the weight limit for a canoe. But, he said, filling a canoe with passengers is up to ride operators.

“We don’t ask the people what they weigh when they get on. That’s up to the judgment of the operators,” he said.

But Camara and Pirtle said they thought that the operators allowed too many heavyset passengers onto the same canoe.

Helm, who said he grabbed a camera and took several photographs, did so after he saw more than half a dozen “super-heavyweights” in the canoe.

“We noticed that the boat was awful low in the water and that the people they let get on were super heavyweights. I mean, like some of them had to be 250 pounds plus,” Helm said.

When he saw water lap over the canoe’s gunwales, he grabbed for his camera and told himself, “This boat is going to go down.”