Boating - June 2016 USA

I Learned About

Boating From This ...

By Randy Vance

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ILLUSTRATIONS:

BOATING

ARCHIVES; PHOTOS: BILL DOSTER

A Proper Fit

ONE SIZE DOES NOT FIT ALL WHEN IT

COMES TO LIFE JACKETS.

The impact of this loose

rationale became all too

personal one afternoon

during a photo shoot. I

was manning the chase

boat for our

photographer

and a public

landing was a

half-mile away.

Focused on

holding the boat

and cameraman

in position for his

shot, I noticed

the sound of

an outboard

powering up

from the landing,

then stopping

suddenly with a

thump. After we captured

our photo about 10 minutes

later, I looked out and saw

what appeared to be a dozen

ducks paddling about. We

went for a look.

As we approached, the

ducks were actually fishing

tackle, boat gear, life jackets

and a fuel tank drifting away.

About 50 yards farther, two

men were treading water,

and the younger man was

oddly propping up an adult-

size life jacket on the stem of

his upturned boat.

Then the life jacket

moved. Crying and wailing

inside it, with enough room

to privately change clothes,

was a young boy.

Inside the next 10 minutes,

we pulled this crew from the

water and began to right and

raise their boat.

What We Learned

People under

duress make bad

decisions. Duress

is usually caused

by previous

bad decisions.

First, the

young man had

just launched

his “restored”

skiff after gutting

some rotted wood

and removing the

flotation from it.

Second, the “bang” was

the sound of a plank, used

to raise the outboard’s trim

angle, snapping.

fun and most are for safety.

A coach once told me,

“Contrary to popular belief,

practice does not make

perfect. Perfect practice

makes perfect.”

Boating is exactly that way.

WANTED: YOUR STORIES

Share your boating mistakes and

mishaps so that your fellow

boaters might learn from your

experience. Send us your fi rst-

person accounts, including what

went wrong, what you’d do diff er-

ently, your name and your city, to

[email protected] and use

“ILAB” in the subject line.

Third, the skipper

instantly chopped his power,

and the older gent stepped

aft to look — and that’s when

the following wake rolled

over the transom.

This crew’s bad decisions

continued as they failed to

prioritize between the need

to secure life and the desire to

secure the sinking vessel. And

their panic level increased

because the father realized

that, deep beneath his

irrational rage, the biggest

cause for alarm — the peril

to his son — was entirely the

result of his decisions.

Boating is a sport with a

body of rules. Some are for

BOATING HAS BEEN PUBLISHING THE SHARED MISHAPS OF

readers for decades so that other boaters can learn from

the experiences. In March 1961, the story of two lads

who had no experience with tide rips is related with the

message “we should have sought local knowledge.”

— Kevin Falvey

W

HEN YOU SEE THE IMPACT OF

overlooked safety rules, their logic rings

crisply through the “be a safe boater”

white noise.

Life jackets are required on board, and, in most states,

youth under 12 or 13 years of age must wear them. What is

astonishingly ignored is the requirement that the life jacket

actually fit the child. Boaters all too often go with the “good

enough” rule and use an oversize jacket.

If your child’s

life jacket has

a crotch strap,

buckle it so he or

she can’t slide

out of the vest.

GOOD

FIT

BAD

FIT

30 BOATINGMAG.COM JUNE 2016

Looking

Astern

Looki L

1961