Small boat and cold water

[DaleH]

More than a few potential Darwin Award candidates in these posts!

 

[Ray Clark]

I don't have any similar stories or anything different to add about the effects of cumulative bad decisions.

At least they were wearing PFDs.

I'll say this about foam flotation. I think you'll find that the flotation rating of foam is predicated on that foam being DRY. If the foam is water logged, as so many find in their boats, the flotation rating is useless. If the foam is waterlogged (before the boat sinking), then the "hidden" weight of that water counts against the weight rating of the boat.

 

[Mad Dog 2]

The floatation calculation is based on:
- Load capacity of boat ("max weight" on HIN tag)?
- Or based on the amount floatation needed to float the empty hull level with max rated outboard?
- Or some other criteria of the USCG?

A lot of boats are missing part or all the original floatation that they had when the boat left the factory.
Also the floatation is not always placed to prevent the boat from turning "Turtle" when swamped or flooded.
Had a friend whos boat was swamped on calm day at a inlet by a rogue wave. He and his young passenger spent a hour or so before being rescued off the bottom of the boat.

 

[DaleH]

Yes, have pulled more than a few off the over-turned hulls of small boats. IIRC my brother and I are up to 11 on-the-water rescues ... and I want to STOP counting ... (meaning - BEHAVE, BE SMART people!)

 

[hoarder]

20 or so years ago a buddies wife called me to tell me her 75 year old husband went fishing and never returned that afternoon, after figuring out where went from several who refused to go with him, we found him passed out drunk adrift with his 50ft anchor out in 900ft of water with four rods in the water and a flooded motor.
(He had hung a 150hp on a 15ft trihull and would regularly go places no 15ft boat owner should ever contemplate going), We found him using radar early the next morning unknowingly drifting south east passed out cold with a half empty bottle of scotch. When we woke him he said he had flooded the motor and figured he'd take a nap and wait while he fished some more but he passed out again and just drifted not realizing he was in 900ft water with only 50ft of anchor line. We towed him in that day but it was far from the last time he got stuck somewhere in that boat.
How he lived to see 92 is beyond me. The last time he went out, he had argued with the wife over going and his last words were that he'd be lucky to die out there vs getting old and not being able to fish. When he didn't return that time she calle dthe police and coast guard too. They foud him almost just as far off shore out of gas, and drunk
That ended his driving days, he was 86 then with a touch of dementia so a few of us took his boat and stripped it and cut it up for scrap under orders from his wife. After cutting up the boat it was amazing it held together as long as it did. I had many layers of plusood in the floors, a half ton of water and soaked foam, and a fake registration.
The boat was cheap or free and but had no title so he 'borrowed ' one from another boat. He never got caught and somehow managed to run it like hat for more than 10 years.

 

[freeisforme]

Old glass boats with rotten wood buried in several layers of plywood with water logged foam are all too common. About half of the guys I know keep their boat outside year round, uncovered. Many have patches on top of patches and motors that barely run but they keep going.
All are broke old guys who retired years ago and most won't spend a nickle to do it right if cheap suffices for now.
When I lived in FL I had a neighbor there who owned a 1950's era half wood, half fiberglass 14ft boat. He would run out of Gov. cut in Miami every weekend, he'd go out late on Friday, and stay on the water till he caught fish, sometimes staying out in that tiny boat for three days sleeping under the bow deck adrift in the ocean. A few times he drifted too far, one time he drifted into a storm and nearly sunk the boat. He did it till he was in his early 80's. He gave the boat away after he fell overboard trying to rinse his hands of cut bait and almost didn't get back in the boat. The boat had a mid 50's Johnson 15hp on it that was missing its cover for years. He'd also take a bottle of Jim Beam with him as well, he said it helped him sleep and not worry about the boat sinking while he slept out there.
He would go out there, with no radio, no phone, no tools, and no registration on the boat, He said he had paid enough for the boat back when it was new and he's not paying any more for it. As far as I know he never got stopped or asked for papers and never got any tickets.

 

[Billy H]

The life jackets saved those two old guys no doubt. lucky hypothermia didn’t get them.
Cold water and cold air temps ain’t no joke. When I was about ten years old some friends and I were down on the local creek messing around on the ice. It was well below freezing and the water had a decent layer of ice on it, along with some snow. We decided to jump up and down on the ice to see if we could crack it. We succeeded! Was over a hole about 4 foot deep. My buddies managed to scamper off to the bank without going in. I wasn’t so lucky I was out in the middle and went in and got soaked up to my neck. The closest place for me to go was my grandmother’s house about a mile away. Within a few minutes my clothes were frozen solid to the point I could barely move my knees. After what seemed like an eternity I made it to the house, a painful frozen walk. Luckily my uncle was there and he knew immediately I was dealing with hypothermia and frostbite on my feet. Having served in Korea he dealt with this kind of thing before and knew what to do. They immediately put me in a tub of Luke warm water and massaged my toes that had begun to turn dusky grey. I was very lucky he was there. It doesn’t take long to get into trouble with water and freezing temps. To this day my feet hurt when they get cold.

 

[Katz]

Ga Tech, Freddy Lanoue, drown-proofing grads?
Being dressed for the weather put off hypothermia when they got wet. Try 40 degree water in a speedo. You'll be in sad shape after 10 minutes.

 

[Dennis W]

Wow what a story and your one of a kind friend.

 

[outboard]

Old glass boats with rotten wood buried in several layers of plywood with water logged foam are all too common. About half of the guys I know keep their boat outside year round, uncovered. Many have patches on top of patches and motors that barely run but they keep going.
All are broke old guys who retired years ago and most won't spend a nickle to do it right if cheap suffices for now.
When I lived in FL I had a neighbor there who owned a 1950's era half wood, half fiberglass 14ft boat. He would run out of Gov. cut in Miami every weekend, he'd go out late on Friday, and stay on the water till he caught fish, sometimes staying out in that tiny boat for three days sleeping under the bow deck adrift in the ocean. A few times he drifted too far, one time he drifted into a storm and nearly sunk the boat. He did it till he was in his early 80's. He gave the boat away after he fell overboard trying to rinse his hands of cut bait and almost didn't get back in the boat. The boat had a mid 50's Johnson 15hp on it that was missing its cover for years. He'd also take a bottle of Jim Beam with him as well, he said it helped him sleep and not worry about the boat sinking while he slept out there.
He would go out there, with no radio, no phone, no tools, and no registration on the boat, He said he had paid enough for the boat back when it was new and he's not paying any more for it. As far as I know he never got stopped or asked for papers and never got any tickets.

I knew a guy like that years ago in NJ, he ran an old trihull, he and a buddy would run that thing miles off shore, often going out for several days at at time just sleeping in the open boat, under a tarp if it rained. They had a frame for a Bimini top but no top, they just carried a blue tarp and duct tape.

One of them finally died, well into his 70's, but the other one kept fishing. Then one weekend he didn't return, his wife had called and asked if anyone had seen him. Apparently he went out on Friday night, alone, in May. She said he filled up the boat, (he had mounted two 40 gallon tanks in boxes above deck under the two back to back seats), and he would carry four full 6 gallon tanks just in case. He was 81 at the time. It was Sunday night when his wife started calling around. She called the coast guard on Monday to report him missing but she had no idea where he fished or where he went.

After no one saw him by Tues morning, a few of us went with another buddy who had a mini speed boat that he ran offshore from time to time, it could cover a lot of water fast. With 400 gallons of fuel on board and twin engines it could run at a decent speed for hours and still be able to make it back, plus the boat had a 150 gallon reserve tank just in case. We started out around 8am, got to the area where he normall fished and starting scanning using the radar. We searched till about 2am, then got a call that someone saw a small boat about 32 miles off shore about 40 miles south of us. We headed that way and after a bit of searching and scanning we found him, he was out of gas, still fishing, with a cooler full of beer and two bottles of Scotch. He couldn't figure out why we came looking for him, he had no idea how long he was out there, he had been eating fish he caught, drinking and he figured that sooner or later, even with no engine, he'd drift into land sooner or later. He said he was fine and didn't want a tow.

We didn't give him any choice and tied up his boat and got back to the dock. He had gone better than 100 miles in all. Leaving out of Cape May and heading north about 80 miles and off shore about 35 or so. He was drifting south about even with Ocean City, NJ when we found him, about 30 miles from land in a 15ft trihull with more sketchy patches and bad repairs than we could count. He wasn't worried because he had four batteries, a solar panel to charge the batteries, and 8 bilge pumps all wired separately. Including one 1500gph monster. He didn't think he was in trouble at all, he was perfectly content with just letting the current take him where it may. He had fish, and alcohol, he was happy.

We hauled the boat back to my buddies place, it sat there for two weeks, and over the time the transom gave way and the motor fell back, nearly completely off the boat. The boat had 9 layers of 3/4" plywood on the floor, each later added to fix the last one that rotted away. It had two 40 gallon tanks, and he had five 6 gallon tanks, all empty when we found him. His wife offered to pay us to loose the boat somewhere.

They moved away later that year, moving to a senior only development out of state but the boat sat there for years until my buddy finally pulled the motor off it and buried it somewhere. He lived for another 15 or so years from what I heard, but I think his wife pretty much put an end to his offshore fishing in small boats. I still have the motor, it does run great but he's lucky it and the boat didn't end up at the bottom of the Atlantic Ocean back then.

 

[Katz]

I knew a guy like that years ago in NJ, he ran an old trihull, he and a buddy would run that thing miles off shore, often going out for several days at at time just sleeping in the open boat, under a tarp if it rained. They had a frame for a Bimini top but no top, they just carried a blue tarp and duct tape.

One of them finally died, well into his 70's, but the other one kept fishing. Then one weekend he didn't return, his wife had called and asked if anyone had seen him. Apparently he went out on Friday night, alone, in May. She said he filled up the boat, (he had mounted two 40 gallon tanks in boxes above deck under the two back to back seats), and he would carry four full 6 gallon tanks just in case. He was 81 at the time. It was Sunday night when his wife started calling around. She called the coast guard on Monday to report him missing but she had no idea where he fished or where he went.

After no one saw him by Tues morning, a few of us went with another buddy who had a mini speed boat that he ran offshore from time to time, it could cover a lot of water fast. With 400 gallons of fuel on board and twin engines it could run at a decent speed for hours and still be able to make it back, plus the boat had a 150 gallon reserve tank just in case. We started out around 8am, got to the area where he normall fished and starting scanning using the radar. We searched till about 2am, then got a call that someone saw a small boat about 32 miles off shore about 40 miles south of us. We headed that way and after a bit of searching and scanning we found him, he was out of gas, still fishing, with a cooler full of beer and two bottles of Scotch. He couldn't figure out why we came looking for him, he had no idea how long he was out there, he had been eating fish he caught, drinking and he figured that sooner or later, even with no engine, he'd drift into land sooner or later. He said he was fine and didn't want a tow.

We didn't give him any choice and tied up his boat and got back to the dock. He had gone better than 100 miles in all. Leaving out of Cape May and heading north about 80 miles and off shore about 35 or so. He was drifting south about even with Ocean City, NJ when we found him, about 30 miles from land in a 15ft trihull with more sketchy patches and bad repairs than we could count. He wasn't worried because he had four batteries, a solar panel to charge the batteries, and 8 bilge pumps all wired separately. Including one 1500gph monster. He didn't think he was in trouble at all, he was perfectly content with just letting the current take him where it may. He had fish, and alcohol, he was happy.

We hauled the boat back to my buddies place, it sat there for two weeks, and over the time the transom gave way and the motor fell back, nearly completely off the boat. The boat had 9 layers of 3/4" plywood on the floor, each later added to fix the last one that rotted away. It had two 40 gallon tanks, and he had five 6 gallon tanks, all empty when we found him. His wife offered to pay us to loose the boat somewhere.

They moved away later that year, moving to a senior only development out of state but the boat sat there for years until my buddy finally pulled the motor off it and buried it somewhere. He lived for another 15 or so years from what I heard, but I think his wife pretty much put an end to his offshore fishing in small boats. I still have the motor, it does run great but he's lucky it and the boat didn't end up at the bottom of the Atlantic Ocean back then.

It's like gold fever. Only with fish. A friend of my brother had it. He would fish the gulf stream, northern FL, for days at a time, from an electric trolling motor powered Aluminum canoe with home made outrigger. He credited the batteries with adding stability.

 

[BugleCoveTinBoat]

Two days ago I got call from a buddy, who is in his 70's saying his boat sunk, and he wanted to know what the chances are of retrieving it. It was 30 degrees out, with high winds, and about 3pm and I was an hour away counting time to hitch up my boat, get fuel, and get down to where he was at 25 miles away.

Apparently him and a friend of his, also in his late 70's, took his 14ft jon boat out with a 9.9hp motor on it, four rods, two tackle boxes, a battery, a fish finder, and a bucket of bait out on the river on a windy day. It was 27°F outside with 30 mph wind gusts.
The boat took on water for some reason and sunk.

They both had life vests on and both managed to get to shore and back to the van where they were able to warm up.
Knowing the river moved pretty fast there I had my doubts whether their boat would still be near where it sank, but I was surprised it was able to just sink as well. According to him it its not that old, an early 90's model or so at best.

My buddy is a big guy, 6ft 5in tall and about 250lbs or so, his buddy maybe 6ft 200 lbs, both in a boat with maybe a 550lb max limit. When I got there with my boat in tow, they were more pissed off about the five fish they lost than the fact they were soaked in ice water with no clue how to get their boat back.

I launched my boat, a 17ft V hull, and made my way to where they said their boat sunk, using my fish finder I saw nothing but headed down stream a bit and spotted it, sitting motor down on the bottom bow pointing straight up. With my buddy in the boat, (the friend stayed in the van warming up), we were able to get a grapple hook onto the bow rope and after a few tries got hold of the 25 ft or so long rope tied to the bow eye on one end and an anchor on he other. After removing the anchor, we were able to secure it to the bow of my boat.

The bow was about 8ft down off to the one side of the river in some mud. with the sunk boat tied off, I was able to back up and dislodge the boat using the buoyancy of the bow bobbing in the waves. Once free fo the muck on the bottom it became like huge drift anchor that was trying to pull us down stream. we managed to get the rope tied to both rear cleats on my boat and my 50hp was able to pull it upstream until it surfaced, it was still flooded but on the surface for the time being.
He said his boat had no drain plug so it wasn't going to self drain and it didn't want to pull straight, it kept trying to flip to the right.

Using the fact it was trying to go to the starboard side, I managed to get it to tow behind my boat just off to the right using only one cleat on my starboard side and towed it that way until we got to the dirt ramp where they launched. When it was at the ramp area, we let it drift ashore enough to settle on the dirt ramp, still sunk but in reach in about a foot of water or so. I came back around, loaded my trailer, then had him back his trailer down and using both his boat winch, and two hand winches, we managed to get the boat to the point where he could start bailing water out of it. It came afloat after about the tenth bucket of water and he was able to get into the back of the boat, tilt the motor and we winched it onto to the trailer while standing in ice water along side of the submerged trailer.

He took his boat home but the motor is here, as soon as I got it in the garage I turned it over with the plugs out letting it drain. Surprisingly there was almost no oil in the water but the cylinders were full of brackish water, as was the carb and intake, which had started to freeze on the ride home. I split the carb open and dunked it in a bowl of WD40 for a bit, and I flushed the motor with a pint or so of it too, I drained the oil, flushing it out twice with mineral spirits and then with some fresh oil.
The cylinders got flushed about several times as well until I didn't get any more water out of them. The motor is a 2009 9.9hp Mercury.

I then blew out the carb, pushed fresh fuel through the fuel pump with my fuel tank, and put it all back together a little while ago, and with a shot of fuel down the carb, it fired up and idled just fine in a warm garage in my run barrel.
He got lucky again in that the motor survived. Somehow even the cover survived it all.

The tank, which was still attached, was full of water, and the fuel fitting area is split open from being lifted by the fuel hose when we first found it. They went back there in the dark to look for their fishing tackle in hopes their tackle boxes washed ashore down stream somewhere. One fishing rod was in the rod holder but snapped in half when we got the boat to the surface.

After all that, and besides the better part of a day wasted fishing their boat out of the river, and trying to save his motor, my main concern is why it sank in the first place. The flotation, which is foam built into the bench seats of the boat and in the bow did not float the boat, the motor which weighs about 90lbs, they had a 3gal fuel tank, two medium sized tackle boxes in a 1436 Jon boat.

There's no doubt they had no business out there in the cold on a windy day but its likely not their first time. Luckily they were both healthy enough at their age to swim or make their way to shore.
They said once they got to the shore, on the far side of the river, made their way to the highway bridge after trudging through the marsh a few hundred feet, then walked across the bridge and back to their van on the other side while completely soaked in below freezing weather and then still they waited around while they got he van warmed up. They refused to leave their boat behind.

My buddy said that at no point did they ever consider calling the police for help not wanting to get caught fishing out there with a boat that wasn't registered and not realizing that due their age, they neither of them needed a fishing license plus the fact its considered saltwater there which don't require a fishing license.
They got real lucky they didn't end up someplace they couldn't walk out of.

The next day my buddy said he found his tackle box, which was one of my old Plano boxes, he and the same buddy had gone back in a canoe and found it, and two of the rods that were tangled up with it somehow in the reeds about half mile down stream near a bend in the river. He was happier about finding the tackle box than me saving the boat and motor.

There's no doubt they were at the max weight for the boat by the coast guard plate, maybe even over it if that 550lbs is counting motor weight. I'm pretty sure the highest rating on the plate I saw was 550, which likely includes the motor and fuel tank. Either way its not a boat I'd run in a fast moving river, especially in the cold in an area with no one around. If they didn't make to shore, I doubt they'd have found them until their bodies washed up somewhere. Both are widowed old men who live alone with no kids, no one would have missed them, no one would have known where they went until they found the van sitting there the next day. In the end, no one got hurt behind a few sore hands from working in the cold but it really makes you think about those small boats on the water. Luckily they both had left their cell phones in the truck, along with their wallets and keys. If not all of that would likely have been gone or ruined.

For me, a boat like that is nearly useless, or has to be considered a one man boat. I'm 6ft 3in tall, 340lbs or so in my 60's and a boat with a 550 rating is completely out of the question if I hang the 20h max hp on it, take a tackle box, a cooler, and a bait bucket or two. Add in a 50lb battery and its over the limit with just me. Add in the fact that the bigger guy was at the stern running the tiller motor, I can easily see why it swamped.

It sort of stayed at the surface once we got it to the ramp but only the bow was floating. The rear of the boat sat firmly in the sand. It has three bench seats each filled with chunks of white urethane foam in roughly three 30x10x10" chunks glued in under each bench seat.
If I'm figuring right that's 5.2 cubic feet of flotation.

By what I was always told is that every cubic foot of foam gives you about 60lbs of flotation, so a boat with 5.2 cf of foam had only 315lbs of buoyancy or flotation if all the foam is in good condition.

The hull likely weighs in around 150 lbs in aluminum weight, the motor at 90, plus the 50lb battery attached to the floor, an 8 lb danforth anchor and 3ft chain, and the fuel tank plus fuel weight. Its no wonder it went to the bottom. Just roughly calculating the weight, the flotation was about at its max weight and if age degraded it a bit, it was all it took to make it sink.

Seeing all this it make me wonder if any of my boats would actually float if swamped as they're supposed to as well.

I didn't call him and tell him the motor is running, I'm thinking maybe I should wait till the water warms up a bit for his own good.

Wow, I'm in that age group. You're a great friend, I wish I had one like you.
From my White Water Days I would have been wearing a 3/16 jacket wet suit and maybe a farmer John 3/16 under that (all under the regular clothes). To your point (other than not going out) flotation is very important, along with the PFD.