Posted on 01/05/2016 2:00:33 PM PST by VRW Conspirator
No matter how much experience you have, it's always a good idea for everyone to review boating safety rules before departures. Below you will find 10 basic boating safety tips to help you stay safe:
1.Be Weather-Wise
Always check local weather conditions before departure; TV and radio forecasts can be a good source of information. If you notice darkening clouds, volatile and rough changing winds or sudden drops in temperature, play it safe by getting off the water.
2.Follow a Pre-Departure Checklist
Proper boating safety includes being prepared for any possibility on the water. Following a pre-departure checklist is the best way to make sure no boating safety rules or precautions have been overlooked or forgotten.
3.Use Common Sense
One of the most important parts of boating safety is to use your common sense. This means operating at a safe speed at all times (especially in crowded areas), staying alert at all times and steering clear of large vessels and watercraft that can be restricted in their ability to stop or turn. Also, be respectful of buoys and other navigational aids, all of which have been placed there to ensure your own safety.
4.Designate an Assistant Skipper
Make sure more than one person on board is familiar with all aspects of your boat's handling, operations, and general boating safety. If the primary navigator is injured or incapacitated in any way, it's important to make sure someone else can follow the proper boating safety rules to get everyone else back to shore.
5.Develop a Float Plan
Whether you choose to inform a family member or staff at your local marina, always be sure to let someone else know your float plan. This should include where you're going and how long you're going to be gone.
A float plan can include the following information: name, address, and phone number of trip leader name and phone number of all passengers boat type and registration information trip itinerary types of communication and signal equipment onboard, such as an Emergency Position Indicating Radio Beacon (EPIRB) or Personal Locator Beacon (PLB)
6.Make Proper Use of Lifejackets
Did you know that the majority of drowning victims are the result of boaters not wearing their lifejackets? Make sure that your family and friends aren’t part of this statistic by assigning and fitting each member of your onboard team with a life jacket prior to departure. Wear it!
7.Avoid Alcohol
Practice boating safety at all times by saving the alcohol for later. The probability of being involved in a boating accident doubles when alcohol is involved and studies have shown that the effects of alcohol are exacerbated by sun and wind.
8.Learn to Swim
If you're going to be in and around the water, proper boating safety includes knowing how to swim. Local organizations, such as the American Red Cross and others, offer training for all ages and abilities. Check to see what classes are offered in your area.
9.Take a Boating Course Beginning boaters and experienced experts alike need to be familiar with the boating safety rules of operation. Boater education requirements vary by state; however, some require validated completion of at least one boating safety course. Regardless of your individual state's requirements, it's always important to be educated and prepared for every circumstance that might arise. You can learn boating safety rules by taking a local community course or online course to help educate yourself.
10.Consider a Free Vessel Safety Check Take advantage of a free vessel safety check from the US Coast Guard. They offer complimentary boat examinations to verify the presence and condition of certain safety equipment required by state and federal regulations. Free of charge, they'll provide a specialist to check out your boat and make helpful boating safety tips and recommendations. They also offer virtual online safety checks as well.
Had I followed this sage advice, I would not have lost all of my firearms in that tragic boat accident.
Who knew a canoe was not the best way to transport a gun safe across Lake Superior?
Ping to our Freeper Gals, you all be careful in your adventures okay? ;)
FReepers are Lousy Boaters) Now why would you say something like that?
You are an admirable communist, comrade!
Viva la revolution; viva la proletariat; viva Marx; viva Lennin; viva Trotsky; viva Stalin; viva Mao; viva Guevera; viva Castro...
aww HELL...I’m all “viva-ed” out.
Feel free to shoot the next free-market capitalist you see and report back to me...
“The searches all say ^stylin_geek would have made Whitefish Bay
If he’d put fifteen more miles behind him
My apologies to Gordon Lightfoot
I would also add please make sure your handguns are very well secured as I had taken my new S & W on my fishing trip off San Diego and when I bent over it slid from my holster and an $800 dollar gun is gone. My insurance carrier said it needed to be insured under a special rider so I guess I will just have to take the loss.
Thank you for the safety tips!
While I have survived my many boating accidents, I have lost a small arsenal of various firearms in the lakes of New Mexico.
Very sad.
Funny, I sold all of mine at various gun shows before today.
In reference to #7, boating sober is like hunting sober...
Now that is funny!!
Personally I have never lost a firearm to a boating accident. I lost mine on a hike when a sudden rift in the earth opened and they fell into hot lava. I hate it when that happens.
Back years ago, my high school son, starting when he was a freshman, worked for free with NASA in the summer, surveying/using scientific measures/chemical analysis, of Clear Creek, a body of water in the NASA area south of Houston (Clear Lake area). By the time he was a senior, he was running that study. He took the Coast Guard boating course and got their certificate. Then, in college, Rice University, took their course for diving/under water exploration and was licensed for that.
All that helped him when he became a director of documentary films which he made across the world, including the North Pole ice sheet and African countries’ lakes, Siberia, the Amazon River, Libyan waterways, Egypt waterways, Israel's coastal waters, etc..
My point is, he was an expert when it came to bodies of water and how to navigate them, HOWEVER, I never trusted him to put ANY of my defensive weapons on any boat, barge, sledge pulled by dogs, police boats, Coast Guard boats, the Alaskan north “water freeze ways”, African waterways.
NEVER put your weapons on anyone’s property that floats (like boats) as they are naturally magnetized to want to lie on the bottom of water. They will jump into water all by themselves and you will never get them back.
I do not care how experienced the person is who is on the water, you are going to lose your freaking weapons if you allow them to be above water - just wait, someone is going to post on this thread that they lost their weapons because they had them above water.
How many more weapons are going to be lost because you do not understand, will not accept, weapons love water, are magnetized to be on the bottom of the water - sheesh, you are so dense not to believe my study of water and weapons.
#1 correlation with boating tragedies is the same as the #1 correlation with swimming, rv, snowmobile, skiing, hunting tragedies. It is the same as the #1 correlation with tragedies in the home, tragedies with guns, tragedies on the highway.
Alcohol statistically has the #1 correlation with most all tragedies.
I just obtained my Dad’s Ranger bass boat. He had it for 28 years and can no longer manage the ins and outs at his age.
I am looking for the smart way to carry on his passion. So ANY advice would be appreciated. It is a very well maintained boat and I have been afforded the luxury of decent weather to test it out on Lake Lanier.
NOW - My guns have not taken a swimming class and will wear life jackets when motoring around. But I cannot prevent them from enjoying the water like I do.
It also correlated to my first pregnancy!
Mrs. Bears had that same experience.
Probably a good thing that, at the time, I had just experienced the first of many tragic boating accidents.
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