Man Drops a GoPro Camera In The Depths Of World’s Deadliest Stream — Then He Saw The Footage

On the surface, the Strid appears deceptively harmless, just like any other river. Hugged by woodlands, the banks are carpeted with fallen leaves and overhanging rocks that are slick with moss and dew. But come too close, and the tantalizing watercourse turns into a fiery monster that pulls you in. The evasive nature of this killer creek doesn’t spare anyone, even if all they do is just a little hop or leap across. Whatever tries to touch it is consumed by the barrage of gushing waters it unleashes in rapturous momentum. In a video that has terrified millions of people, YouTuber @jackasnacks shared what his GoPro camera recorded as he descended it into the deadly stream.

Flowing in North Yorkshire, the Strid is a narrow, dangerous, and dramatic portion of the River Wharfe where the river is forced to flow through a narrow gap in the rocks, spilling into a series of waterfalls and rapids. As the 60-meter (197 feet) gap is suddenly narrowed to 6 meters (19 feet), the pressure created within the narrow trajectory triggers a restless whirlpool of undercurrents that is as unbridled as wind in a desert. In 1998, the ghostly river swallowed a honeymooning couple in its mouth while they were strolling at its banks, as per BBC. Plus, there are countless accounts of deaths hovering above this stream.

“The Strid at Bolton Abbey is world famous for having a 100% fatality rate. Watch what I find when I put my underwater camera down there. It is chaos,” the YouTuber exclaimed in the caption of the viral footage. To do his experiment, he employed a GoPro camera in a waterproof case and attached it to the end of the "world's longest selfie stick." A torch was reinforced with a garden stake and all the equipment was bound together with cable wires. The man then visited the bank of the Strid, tugging along his recording equipment.

On the surface, the footage showed, the river appeared usual and calm with bits of foamy material shining in the sunlight. As the GoPro was pushed deeper and deeper into the narrow rocky gorge, the façade of the calmer waters of the upstream started shifting into a more aggressive expression. From seemingly quiet face, the river became turbulent with agitated trails of bubbles fizzing and shooting upwards. “Millions of air bubbles running up the walls of the ledges. As these air bubbles rise, you fall,” the YouTuber described. The further deeper the camera went, the more agitated these bubbles became.

The YouTuber also captured the strange color change a person might observe if they were unlucky enough to be pulled in by the vigorous currents. In almost an eerie glow, the color of the surface water changed from blue to lime green to golden brown the more the camera descended. “This is what you would see if you were being dragged under. That color change gives me the creeps. The water rushing over you [is] trapping you from getting back to the surface,” he explained. Moving on, he plunged the camera into a part of the river where the current was relatively stronger than that on the surface, around 3 feet deep. 

At this point, the footage became eerie, showing an unconstrained torrent of golden green waters gushing all around, as if someone was being sucked inside the whirlpool of an endless tunnel of water. Meanwhile, the creator constantly wrestled against the equipment as the water tried to loosen it from his grip. After the video was recorded and he pulled the camera upwards, the ferocious waters began to quiet down again. As he pulled out the camera from the gorge of water, the river once again wore the mask of serenity, and everything appeared lush and melodious as it had always been. But only those who watched the entire scene, know that this surface mask is just to deceive those who would never investigate the deep water currents.