Plop.........

T

Torbay

New Member
Joined
30 Sep 2002
Messages
18
Visit site
This is a serious question from a newbie. We've enjoyed our introduction to motor boats and are thinking in the longer-term to buy our own. I'll come back with my questions on that later!

My first question may sound daft ... but I don't swim and I'm scared of the water but love it once I'm on. My question is, is it daft to think about boating? More specifically how often do motor boaters fall in the water?!

My rationale is that being more nervous of the water might make me more careful? Is that delusion or what!?

J
 
Sorry , my answer has to be ' More often than if they stayed on dry land'.

Do everyone a favour and learn to swim. You'll enjoy it , and then boating more without the fear.



...I wanna boat please..
 
yes, you should be confident in the water. I wd class myself as an very good swimmer, but this isn't necessary: you simply have to be confident enough to float for ages, retrieve others from the water, leap in without worrying, and so on. You'll never be a good enough swimmer to swim away from a busted boat in the channel, and don't need to be.
 
Motor boaters hardly ever fall in by accident. The one exception is Coliholic, who falls in a lot. Every time in fact.

Often if you did fall in, your survive/not survive might not depend on whether you're a good swimmer.

My father cannot swim and has motorboated all his life, big seas and cross channel stuff. But despite all this, it's obviously better if you can swim or at least tread water and stabilise yourself with your lifejacket whilst waiting to be rescued. You do need to wear a lifejackt imho
 
I've never fallen in and don't know any who has strangely. Other advice given obvious, learn to swim plus wear
a life jacket if it makes you feel better. Should not let this put you off boating you'll get over your fear in time

"The Med has got me" (no not the Medway the other Med)
 
......... so you are saying you should take it up if you can't swim?

Interestingly I was told a couple of days ago that I'd be suprised at how many captains couldn't swim and were scared of the water! Was this untrue do you think?
 
im not a v good swimmer i have got a boat and i feel safe(never fell in yet),if i dont feel safe i wear a lifejacket at the end of the day boatin is fun

i am who i say i am
 
As a fairly poor swimmer, I wear an auto-lifejacket : swimming's easy if something else is keeping you afloat.

Get boating!

(only time we've seen people fall in is leaping onto bouncy pontoons when "parking".<g>)
 
Well I nearly cant swim. Trouble with ears as a kid, so was not allowed. Never think about wearing life jacket. Job to remember where they are. I think one says age 6 and the other maybe 9. But I have been thinking of buying a new one for the last few years!! Has a big advantage though. I darnt fall in!!

<font color=red> No one can force me to come here-----------
----- I'm a Volunteer! /forums/images/icons/smile.gif

Haydn
 
I learnt to swim when I was 35 and it changed my life into a water fanactic, I took up windsurfing, snorkling, learned to scuba dive, then boats.
Bite the bullet take yourself along to adult classes this autumn you will find there are loads of people in the same 'boat' . Believe me it will change your life. There is no such thing as a non swimmer.
go for it
David
 
I was deep sea for over ten years and not able to swim and many of the people I sailed with were (literally) in the same boat - including quite a few captains !
Theory was if you fell over mid ocean you wouldnt last long anyway so why prolong the agony !/forums/images/icons/laugh.gif
I have an automatic lifejacket which I always wear if I am single handing but must admit I rarely wear it on the river if I have others on board. I did ask a question recently about " killcords" for bigger motorboats but didnt get any satisfactory answers. Serious question though....if I fell off when singlke handing the boat would just keep going....might not get far but could cause a lot of mayhem/damage!

<A target="_blank" HREF=http://www.boatsontheweb.com/galleryframes.html> BoatsOnTheWeb and Boaters Photo Gallery</A>
 
It helps loads if you can swim, my dad can but not out of his depth and he fell into the marina once. For him it wasnt too bad cause there are plenty of liferings to hand but he'd have been put off if that was out at sea.
I am a compenent swimmer, but have fallen in once. Even for me it was the shock of the cold water that stunned me and all the clothes i had to drag along that made it very tiring. But, wearing a lifejacket made it that much easier and i was fine.
Learn to swim, it will help loads with confidence as much as any thing
 
No, i don't think i wd go as far as say don't do it if can't swim. I wd be religious about all on board wearing a lifejacket, same for all crew (cos they'd be more on their own if fell in) and having some good means of getting out (and getting others out) if fell in including in harbour (put swim ladder down). And i wd learn to swim and/or be more confident in water.
 
I see on the TV recently that most of Captain Cooks crew on the voyage to Aus could'nt swim either,
as well as Cook himself.

"The Med has got me" (no not the Medway the other Med)
 
As the board's resident expert on falling in I can certainly tell you it gives everyone a good laugh when you do fall in. And I've rescued probably four or five boaters who've fallen in. One of whom couldn't swim and she really panicked at first then when she realised that the water was only four feet deep and she could walk to the riverbank saw the funny side of it. Mind you she's learnt to swim since and she was 60 last weekend..

Never really bothers me when I fall in though, since I can swim. Some people think I do it on purpose, but not true, I just find water a bit magnetic - or maybe I'm just a bit accident prone? Piccie on the left is me just after falling in off tcm's boat, just to prove it.

Have had quite a few non swimmers on my boat, I always ask any visitors if they can swim when they come aboard and offer them a lifejacket. Sort of insist that they wear it even on the river, especially kiddies, though the river's rarely much more than 4 or 5 feet deep. Surprising the number of people even on the river who always wear LJ's. Doesn't look silly and no-one laughs, so my advice would be go for the boat but always wear the LJ. Why not learn to swim over the winter? There must be classes at your local pool.
 
I started boating by spending my holidays on board offshore trawlers on the NE coast of Scotland. The fishermen could not swim & would not learn, they reckon it just prolonged the agony. However I think they were both right & wrong, if you go plop within swimming distance of something reachable ie 300 yd in cold water then you might possibly survive, anymore & you probably wo'nt. Your best survival techniques are:
1) Do'nt fall off
2) if you do have a life jacket & oilskins on

Get a hold of the video about cold water survival.

Jim
 
You must log in or register to reply here.

Share this page

Top