I don’t think I want a switch that kills me if I fall overboard!
Do all boats even have a wireless kill switch?
Had that feature on the boat I bought in 1988.
Little clip that held a button down.
Should not have to be a law. It is just a good idea.
Include Canoes.
And rowboats full of hunting arms.
And they dare call it a “KILL” switch?
So very glad the government will save me from EVERY malady facing humanity! Kill switches for boating is completely unnecessary. For jet skis? Sure, makes sense. But for boats? Absolutely not. And I’ve owned and operated both.
Just more insane nanny state nonsense put into place because the do-gooders simply must reward themselves with the personal satisfaction of “doing something”.
Treadmills also have kill switch lanyards...at least the ones in pulmonary rehab do.
I had a friend many years ago who was fishing in the Puget Sound by himself. He stood up, turned and fell into the water. His boat continued on its way so he had to swim to shore (with no life jacket). Although he was a good swimmer and it was only 200 yards away, the water was very cold and he barely made it.
Surely if these are important in boats, they’re doubly so on aircraft.
If you go on YouTube, it’s obvious that the average treadmill user has no idea what this is.
On a jet ski or a dinghy, absolutely, but there are a lot of 26 foot boats where a kill switch just doesn’t work. You can’t safely operate them sitting at the helm, all the time.
Docking, for example, is usually done by lassoing a stern spring line while in idle forward. The low thrust of the engine against the pull of the spring line holds the boat stationary and pulled into the dock while the other lines are made fast.
You can’t safely dock, single-handed, if the engine shuts off when you step away from the helm.
Good idea or not this is just another way to tax people thru fines.
California needs to fall into the ocean, and I live here...
My pontoon boat came with one from the factory, about 10 years old, however My Jet Boat doesn’t have it and it will stop as soon as I fall out and my foot comes off the Gas Pedal.
Both my Boats are AZ (Colorado River) so I don’t care, but it will give the CA Sheriff Boats another reason to pull over CA boats and extract money for their pensions.
I saw Kali together with kill switch and everything went south from there. I was expecting hi tech thuggees in boats. All that aside, it sounds like something a person would want to do.
Clip-on switches been in all my bass boats since the late 70’s early 80’s...
Essential piece of common sense... Nothing worse for your psyche than leaving your boat at 70-mph after unexpectedly hitting a towed-barge wake... Or flying out of a wind-protected creek into a main body of water and discover those thrilling 3-4 ft rollers...
Yep. Now they just need something to help overworked parents who forget to drop off their kids at day care or school. There has to be something. I was thinking a daily phone call to the persons boss who would walk to his employee and ask if they dropped the kids off. Lol.
Engine kill switches have been standard equipment on almost all small boats and tiller steered outboards for at least 40 years. In the vast majority of cases, it’s just a small plastic clip with a lanyard that is attached to the driver. More recently, there are electronic versions (google FELL MARINE) where the driver wears a “man overboard (MOB) device” that kills the engine if he moves more than XX feet from the helm, or the device is submerged in water. There are also MOB devices for passengers, so that if a passenger falls overboard, the kill switch sounds an alert tone.
Just like when seatbelt laws were passed, it took folks a long time to get onboard. Even though almost all small boats have engine kill switches, probably less than half of people use them. On boats, I think it’s going to be hard to enforce, as even when people aren’t using them, the lanyard is hanging right there at the helm, and in most cases it won’t be obvious that you are not using it.
Can you get one for your sailboat?