California passed a new boating license law
- Thread starter Waterbaby
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Grant Stevens - USBR
Well-Known Member
Ouch, poor kid, he hit hard... My boys are the same age, 12 and 14, no matter how much I talk with them and try to teach them, often they still learn lifes lessons the hard way...
Waterbaby
Escalante-Class Member
A sad number of jet ski/boat accidents on Havasu and up the river around Needles and Laughlin is young kids driving them and turning in front of a boat as they head the other direction on the water. Children do not have the experience to understand boats cannot stop on a dime and when you turn directly in front of them little time to react and avoid a collision.
Endurance
Well-Known Member
Ryan, Squirrel, I don't care who you are; that is funny. I am sitting at work laughing out loud!
capt.catfish
Active Member
This thread shook lose a memory from my childhood. I was about 10-yrs old and I was waiting in our boat at the dock at Bullfrog while my dad was in buying some engine parts for the houseboat. There was a family being given an orientation on a rental boat across the dock from me by a teenager that I assume was employed for the summer and I was eavesdropping. I heard the teenager tell them that the green buoys marked safe water and that the red buoys marked danger. Even at 10 I knew that wasn't right; I'm not the most forward, but I screwed up my courage and after the teenager walked off I explained that they were channel markers. Thinking back on it, I would guess that the advice from a random 10-yr old didn't trump the "official" orientation they were given.
My parents let me drive their SeaDoos when I was 14 (this was before laws prohibited such), but they drilled safety into me and made sure I had plenty of practice with one of them riding on the back before they turned me lose. I never had a single close call, but I'm not what you'd call a daredevil.
My parents let me drive their SeaDoos when I was 14 (this was before laws prohibited such), but they drilled safety into me and made sure I had plenty of practice with one of them riding on the back before they turned me lose. I never had a single close call, but I'm not what you'd call a daredevil.
Grant Stevens - USBR
Well-Known Member
Very sad, this is similar to the 13 year old on the jet ski who's vision was obscured by driving into the setting sun. With a well let shoreline of the casino area, it is difficult to pick out lighted navigation buoy's and boats. (Try coming into Los Angeles harbor at night with a hundred red and green stop lights hiding the red and green lighted buoys...)
It sounds like the driver of the Eliminator was not only driving without lights, but driving too fast. It's sad that any light on board could of prevented this. If your nav lights are not working, use any other light such as deck lights, a flashlight or a cellphone, all can help make you visible and avoid a collision (driving lights too, but not desirable as it blinds other boaters.)
Sad, stay safe out there!
We were involved in one of those accidents going thru the gorge (right where the cable car goes across the river), we were going north at 30mph, with 5 boats in a row, no more than 100 yards apart, and a jet ski pulled straight out from the shallows right into the side of the boat............not even the front of the boat. The boat driver swerve away, and the jet ski driver went right under the boat.....needless to say it turned out fatal. We had kids on the boat ranging down to 5 years old. It was a sad day for all. The Jet ski driver was a 30 year old woman............boyfriend was on the back of the ski and jump to safety with no injuries. If she would have just looked, we couldn't have been missed. 5 wakeboard boats going 30mph (maybe) going upstream are not hard to see if she would have just turned her head and took a look downstream.
WB, sorry for the mis interpretation. I have nothing against Trump, Buffett, or anyone else, who have made their money working. Believe me. I am not a Bernie Sanders Commie! It just seems like most of the problems come from the Megabuck boats, no matter where they made their money. It seems like their over privileged kids have no respect for anyone else!
Waterbaby
Escalante-Class Member
Cookie that reminds me of a accident one 4th July weekend just above Topoc we were following some friends, who had their three young daughters with them, headed toward the Laughlin area when a boat pulling a skier came by our port side and then cut between our boat and our friends' boat and then put their skier on a whip as the boat cut back across in front of our friend's boat. When they did this because the area was narrow and they had their skier on a long rope he hit the rocks, his ski literally flew up and over the rocks and who knows where it ended up, but the skier was laying face down in the water bleeding from the head profusely... the boat that had been pulling him did not stop and headed back toward Topoc .. our friends stopped, we stopped, all we could do was get his face out of the water so he would not drown and pull him onto the deck of our friend's boat and we turned around and high-tailed it full speed back to Topoc to call for medical help...... as we were going in the wakeless zone a boater yelled at us to slow down and George yelled we had an emergency coming in behind us and needed to call for medical help at the Marina [help had to come out of Needles]... turned out the person was a neuro surgeon and he turned around and followed us to the marina where George went to call for help and as soon as our friends arrived went to work on the guy [his head had been gashed right down to the sinus cavity]... eventually the people who had been pulling him showed up - right around the time the ambulance showed up. If we had not stopped, he likely would have died. Needless to say it cured us of boating the river on holiday weekends, too crazy - it is bad enough on a normal summer weekend...
tim roberts
Member
Ok, how much is this going to cost?
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