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From: Faure, Marin (no email)
Date: Wed Oct 01 2003 - 15:49:35 EDT
Marin wrote:
>>I've seen what happens when a go-fast boat hits a log that's escaped a
boom a couple hundred miles up the coast and has meandered down our way.
Not that we'd escape Scott-free if we hit it at 8 knots, but at 17 or 20
knots, the bang is pretty loud and expensive."
Joe answered-
>Which is why..... "The skippers stood up on their flying bridges
staring grimly ahead and the hell with any small boats or slow boats
that happened to be nearby."
You'd think so, but given the number of go-fast boats that hit things in
a major way around here, be they floating or attached to the bottom, it
would appear a fair number of these skippers who are staring grimly
ahead are not staring at obstacles either, let alone whales. A boatyard
manager told me the other year the ratio of collisions by fast boats to
collisions by slow boats based on compiled yard records for the area. I
don't remember what the numbers were, but the fast boat figure was
vastly larger than the slow boat figure. The division point was
something like ten knots.
If you listen to Ch.16 on a sunny, low-wind weekend during the summer in
this area, you will hear perhaps twenty to thirty calls for assistance
on Victoria Coast Guard, Vancouver Coast Guard, Coast Guard Seattle
(which covers the whole of Puget Sound for radio purposes), and Coast
Guard Port Angeles. (Remember, we have perhaps THREE weekends like this
per summer. The rest of the time it's raining and you can't see
anything.)
The majority of the calls are for groundings, followed by breakdowns,
followed by fuel starvation. Even if you can't hear the boater's side
of the conversation, you'll always hear the Coast Guard's broadcast for
assistance, in which they describe the boat. The bulk of the calls
you'll hear are for two types of boats. Fifteen to twenty foot,
no-brand-given "power" boats, and larger fast cruising boats, many of
them Bayliners. Now don't get all defensive about the Bayliner thing-
that brand is the most numerous in the area, so even assuming equality
in all boats, statistics would say there would still be more assistance
calls from Bayliners than other brands. I see more Chevy's broken down
on my commute to work than Ferraris even though a Chevy is vastly more
reliable than a Ferrari.
Unfortunately, you rarely hear the reason for the problem on the radio,
be it a grounding, breakdown due to collision damage, or whatever. The
four Coast Guard stations don't include this information in their
broadcasts, and I suspect many boaters would be reluctant anyway to
admit they went aground because they cut inside a marker or didn't have
a tide chart on board. I'd be reluctant to admit something like this.
So while it's a logical assumption to say that, based on the Coast Guard
and Vessel Assist radio calls, go-fast boaters get into more trouble up
here by hitting things than slow boaters, it's not a particularly
scientific assumption.
Joe added-
>That, and the fact that they may have 1 week to cover an area that you
may have the luxury of taking a month to see. Retired versus vacation?
This can also be true. However, I would guess (perhaps wrongly) that
the majority of boaters around here are weekend boaters. And if a
person has a boat that performs well at 15 or 20 knots, it's a pretty
safe bet that's how they'll run it, even if they're making a short run
from Belllingham to Friday Harbor or Anacortes.
I think the reasons behind the observations I've made are quite broad,
and have more to do with what kind of people buy what kind of boats. Of
course this sort of thing is a huge generality, and there are countless
exceptions. Which is why statements like "Go-fast owners are all like
this" or "trawler owners are all like this," may be true in a general
sort of way but will arouse the ire of all the exceptions who happen to
read them.
So to go out on a limb (which you are free to cut off), I think it's
safe to generalize that trawler owners are in less of a hurry (for a
number of reasons) than other powerboaters. The posts on this list seem
to bear that out. And I think it's safe to assume that the owners of
go-fast boats are generally more concerned with getting there than going
there. I also think it's safe to assume that most trawler owners are
more conscientious, if that's the word, about things like safety,
navigation, and being aware of what's around them, both above and below
the water. And I think it's safe to assume that a relatively large
number of go-fast boaters are inexperienced to a degree, or are not all
that concerned or knowledgeable with their surroundings, including
things like reefs and floating logs.
Since I have the time, here's a specific to illustrate the generality.
It's from a personal observation. A sailboat is at anchor in a bay
quite close to shore. A trawler owner (you) would see this, perhaps
conclude that there was good depth close to shore, but would most likely
consult a chart (paper or plastic, your choice) and a tide chart before
motoring on in to anchor there yourself. A go-fast boater would see the
sailboat, and knowing that sailboats draw "lots" of water, would head on
in there on the assumption that if there's enough water for the
sailboat, there's enough water for him. Nine times out of ten, he'll
probably get away with this. But what the go-fast skipper may not know
is that there are such things as shallow-draft sailboats. Centerboards,
retractable keels, whatever. So that tenth guy can be (and was in the
instance I observed) totally unaware that enough water to float that
particular sailboat is not enough to float him. And the boatyard gets
another customer.
I'm sure there are trawler skippers who would make this same mistake.
But I'm willing to bet (not much, though) that there aren't very many of
them.
I know people with Bayliners and whatnot that boat all year round and
know more about whales and birds and navigation and the geology and
history of this area than I could ever hope to know. I've seen trawlers
operated more recklessly than a jetski driven by a fifteen year old.
But I do believe the things we buy reflect the kind of people we are.
So when that big old three-ton log comes down from BC in search of a
boat to beat up, the chances are he'll collect a go-fast boat long
before he'll snag a trawler.
______________________________
C. Marin Faure
36' Grand Banks "La Perouse"
Bellingham, Washington
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