Offshoreonly.com - Boating Safety Statistics

With all the horrible things that have happened lateley (SOTW) etc.. it got me a little concerned since I'm new to boating (only my 2nd season). I was starting to wonder just how dangerous is it to go boating. Out of curiousity I pulled annual reports for both the US Coast Guard and the NHTSA to see if I could get a set of numbers I could compare.

Here's what I found.

In 2003 for ever 100,000 registered boat users there were 5.5 fatalities for a total of 703 people who died in a boating accident.

In 2003 for every 100,000 registered car owner there were 18.48 fatalities or 38,252 peopled died from a fatal car accident.

The good news is that fatalities have steadily gone down with both cars & boats for the last several years. In 1991 there was an average of 8.3 fatalities per 100,000! The downward trend in boating fataltites is good to see, especially since overall boat ownership has grown 15% since 1991. In 2003 70% of deaths occured from drowning, with an amazing 86% of those due to victims not wearing their PFD's!!!

Here are some more facts which I directly copied form the Coast Guard Report.

The most reported type of accident was a collision with another vessel. However, capsizing and falls overboard are the most reported types of fatal accidents and
accounted for over half (57%) of all boating fatalities.

Overall, operator inattention, carelessness/reckless peration, operator inexperience, and excessive speed are the leading contributing factors of all reported accidents.

The most common types of boats involved in reported accidents were open motorboats (42%), personal watercraft (PWC) (27%) and cabin motorboats (14%). Increases were observed in the number of reported fatalities involving cabin motorboats (64) and canoes and kayaks (87) from 2002. A decrease was observed in the number of fatalities involving open motorboats (359) and PWC (57) from the number of
fatalities reported in 2002

The number of reported injuries involving PWC use continued along a downward trend and has decreased every year since 1996.

Twenty-seven (27) children age 12 and under lost their lives while boating in 2003 compared to 28 children in 2002. Drowning was the reported cause of death for approximately 60% of the children who perished in 2003.

Consistent with previous years, nearly 80% of all reported fatalities occurred on boats where the operator had not received boating safety instruction!!!

Alcohol was involved in 31% of all boating fatalities in 2003; down 8% from 2002

The last bit of info I found useful was fatalities broken down by length of boat.
Less than 16 feet 297
16 feet to less than 26 feet 280
26 feet to less than 40 feet 41
40 feet to not more than 65 feet 8
More than 65 feet 1
Unknown 732 76

Whats great about this forum is that it's such a valuable free way to get safety information from so many people with real life experiences. Next to completing my USCGA Boating Skills & Seamanship Course I have learned much from this great forum on how I can keep myself & my passengers as safe as possible.

Thanks everybody and be Safe!