Is this not just becoming too common.

Sneaky Pete

Sneaky Pete

Well-Known Member
Joined
26 Nov 2009
Messages
920
Location
In the shadows of Faslane.
Visit site
Six crew with just one lifejacket between them were rescued off the coast of Devon after their motorboat capsized.
Read more at http://www.ybw.com/news/motorboats/...linging-to-one-lifejacket#aj3WSsFyrqgCjSvx.99


It just amazes me how many people believe they do not require a life jacket maybe they think it's not manly enough. They seem to believe it won’t happen to me or I am a strong swimmer and will survive.
In this story they all had a lucky and happy ending. I wonder if they will all be wearing one next time out. Less than £100 to help save a life, pretty cheap.
 
Isn't it more useful to wonder why the boat capsized?
I saw a load of tourists walking along the quay, none of them wearing lifejackets, yet most people who drown don't leave a boat to do so.
 
Sneaky Pete said:
No it's not the first thing to cross my mind after it has capsized, I want to know my chances of survival in the water after an event of capsize, fire, collision or what ever.

Sounds like you are not a fan of lifejackets.
Click to expand...

Kind of with lw395 on this.

If it's a choice of boat capsizing and having lifejacket or boat not capsizing then avoiding the capsize wins for me.

Of course, lifejacket should be carried but as stated before it's a too simplistic message.
 
What concerns me here is that possibly at least 5 of the 6 may simply not have understood the danger they placed themselves in when going out on a boat. Because they have little perception of the dangers of boating they do not even consciously consider what could go wrong.

Instead they probably have a broad assumption boating is safe and that the person who does know has all this under control. If things go wrong this will be affecting someone else. Worst of all is when kids get put in this dangerous situation, they don't even have the ability to consider their safety.

No lifejackets - likely no flares, VHF, etc, etc. For years I was a roughy toughy who believed lifejackets were for wimps. I now accept and follow the RNLI advice 'Useless unless worn'.

Yet another nail in the coffin for regulation free boating.
 
superheat6k said:
No lifejackets - likely no flares, VHF, etc, etc.
Click to expand...

They were rescued before the lifeboat reached them and the lifeboat go to them within five minutes! I don't know Lyme Bay but I imagine at 1.30pm on a sunny Sunday afternoon you hardly need flares and VHF to get rescued if you fall in.
 
CreakyDecks said:
They were rescued before the lifeboat reached them and the lifeboat go to them within five minutes! I don't know Lyme Bay but I imagine at 1.30pm on a sunny Sunday afternoon you hardly need flares and VHF to get rescued if you fall in.
Click to expand...
Exmouth beach has well over 1,000 people on it on a sunny weekend afternoon, there is a NCI watch tower, two lifeboats (including a shiny Shannon class) and lots of boats (sail and mobo) about. I am surprised it took as long as 5 mins for them to be picked up.
 
jac said:
Kind of with lw395 on this.

If it's a choice of boat capsizing and having lifejacket or boat not capsizing then avoiding the capsize wins for me.

Of course, lifejacket should be carried but as stated before it's a too simplistic message.
Click to expand...

So the message here is we will avoid capsizing today, you don’t need to wear your lifejackets now. Don’t be a wimp be manly? However if you fall overboard there is a collision or fire good news is we carry lifejackets. You might as well carry several bags of cement they will be just as useless as the lifejackets you were carrying. It’s a personal thing I prefer not to carry the lifejacket but to wear it there is something that makes me feel more secure. Better being a living wimp than a dead one.
 
Lyme Bay is a very big place; it wouldn't take many minutes in the average E-Bay mobo to get out of sight of the bucket & spade punters on the beach, inc watch towers, and there tend to be big waves there.

However people setting off ill equipped in dodgy boats has been a problem since the Stone Age, maybe such berks have a false sense of security nowadays with mobile phones, and the TV programmes showing the lifeboat - or better still a helicopter to get a ride in - as always getting there in time to whisk people ashore before last orders...
 
Seajet said:
However people setting off ill equipped in dodgy boats has been a problem since the Stone Age, maybe such berks have a false sense of security nowadays with mobile phones, and the TV programmes showing the lifeboat - or better still a helicopter to get a ride in - as always getting there in time to whisk people ashore before last orders...
Click to expand...

Here here! Too much TV..

Very naive of the 'captain'... Haven't read the story so maybe a follow up on my comment here but the should always be enough life jackets on board for ALL crew!
But as we/I normally sail offshore in pretty cold waters I'm one for always stay on the boat, but obviously that couldn't be the case in this situation.
 
superheat6k said:
What concerns me here is that possibly at least 5 of the 6 may simply not have understood the danger they placed themselves in when going out on a boat. Because they have little perception of the dangers of boating they do not even consciously consider what could go wrong.

Instead they probably have a broad assumption boating is safe and that the person who does know has all this under control. If things go wrong this will be affecting someone else. Worst of all is when kids get put in this dangerous situation, they don't even have the ability to consider their safety.

No lifejackets - likely no flares, VHF, etc, etc. For years I was a roughy toughy who believed lifejackets were for wimps. I now accept and follow the RNLI advice 'Useless unless worn'.

Yet another nail in the coffin for regulation free boating.
Click to expand...

Which? Is the danger they put themselves in the nail in the coffin or is the idea that everyone stepping into a boat should be regulated in behavior the nail in the coffin?
 
Wouldn't the bathing beauties suntans look a little unusual if they had been wearing life jackets?

Horses for courses; Maybe they were only operating 100m from shore with a boat full of swimmers, hence the lack of LJs?

(I have and wear lj and/or bj as and when I deem appropriate)
 
We picked up a chap who had fallen out of his boat, after only ten minutes, 60-ish, he was going under every wave. I had to get (14.5 tons) right alongside him first go, and not run him down. Otherwise would have thrown no.one son in after him, trouble is then I would have had two to retrieve. In a L/J there would have been plenty of time and no panic. If it were just me aboard I might have got hold of him but what then? Can't let him go to get the winch in gear, or get a strop to secure him, all would have to be ready in advance.
Adrenaline is a strange thing, after we got him aboard my hand was shaking so much I couldn't replace the radio mic. Panpan and ambulance on the quay, he was unconscious when we got alongside after ten minutes.
 
Sneaky Pete said:
Six crew with just one lifejacket between them were rescued off the coast of Devon after their motorboat capsized.
Read more at http://www.ybw.com/news/motorboats/...linging-to-one-lifejacket#aj3WSsFyrqgCjSvx.99


It just amazes me how many people believe they do not require a life jacket maybe they think it's not manly enough. They seem to believe it won’t happen to me or I am a strong swimmer and will survive.
In this story they all had a lucky and happy ending. I wonder if they will all be wearing one next time out. Less than £100 to help save a life, pretty cheap.
Click to expand...

Maybe, but its up to them surely. Or are you suggestiung that lifejackets should be the marine equivalent of car seat belts ie compulsory? Personally I always use one but thats my personal decision.
 
birdseye said:
Maybe, but its up to them surely. Or are you suggestiung that lifejackets should be the marine equivalent of car seat belts ie compulsory? Personally I always use one but thats my personal decision.
Click to expand...

In ireland they are compulsory. It's not often the weather is so Mediterranean that it's uncomfortable.. One tends not to notice an LJ over oiliness anyway. Just as importantly check the gas bottle is screwed in!!!
 
You must log in or register to reply here.

Share this page

Top