"Bob D." wrote in message
...
In article ,
(Gould 0738) wrote:

Maybe it's different in my state, but boating deaths go up exponentially
the
further one gets down below 20 feet LOA.


This a vague correlation, offering no other details like location,
conditions, activity or the captain's experience.

It is my understanding that most boating fatalities take place under calm
conditions, and DO NOT involve recreational boaters, but hunters and
fishermen on small boats that I would not constitute as a recreational
boat. These statistics better illustrate the misuse of and stupidity on a
boat like standing up in a 9 foot john boat, overloading, and not wearing
a PFD. Those fatalities might be skewing the statistics in favor of the
"bigger is better" argument. Factor out the hunters and fisherman and the
calm conditions, and the remaining statistics would hold more relevance.

Hunters & inland fishermen have a relatively high fatality rate when
involved in the "out of boat" type of accident. It is generally thought to
be because they don't generally consider themselves boaters, and thus often
do not take even the simplest safety precautions, such as having & wearing a
PFD, etc. However, these same hunters and fishermen do not constitute a
large percentage of boaters as a whole, and do not, I believe, skew the
stats.

Full stats are available free at
http://www.uscgboating.org/statistic...stics_2002.pdf



Year 2002 (latest available)

LENGTH DROWNINGS OTHER DEATHS* TOTAL
Less than 16 254 77
331

16 to 26 179 111
290

26 feet to 40 feet 19 18
37

40 feet to 65 feet 3 3
6

More than 65 feet 1 3
4

Unknown 68 14
82

Total 524 226
750