i believe that everyone should carry an EDC - always, and especially around water. many of life's bad situations could be avoided if everyone carried a small knife in an easy to reach location, and those which couldnt be entirely avoided might be significantly lessened.
even if - hopefully - you never get a chance to use it to cut yourself free from a burning vehicle, there are countless uses for a knife as a tool during the regular 'day at the office' - from cutting your sandwich in half to opening envelopes, peeling apples, opening bubble-wrap, whatever.
unfortunately with the way society is headed soon we will not be able to carry even 'harmless' utility tools like SAKs. in many places - schools, airports, court & govt buildings, many workplaces, etc - they are already prohibited. i think most of us could walk into just about any room and pick a half dozen items that would be far more lethal to attack people with than the 2" blade on an SAK - hell youd probably fare better bludgeoning someone with a briefcase. when are people going to learn that it is impossible to 'nerf' our entire world by removing all pointy/dangerous objects - its not the objects that kill but the intent of the person wielding them.
its a shame the media doesnt help more - a story like this that paints knives in a positive light will be forgotten tomorrow, but if a schoolkid threatens his teacher with the 1" blade on his leatherman then it will be frontpage news for weeks.
cheers,
-gabriel
The shirt got torn to shreds but luckily I wasn't hurt.