Captain may have had a used GPS from an Apache. On normal boats that would be marked as "buoy", but on an Apache GPS it's marked as "navigational speed bump".

from the looks of the damage i would say the boat was not traveling at a high rate of speed,also how many fountain,s or any performance boats have radar?my guess,not many.

I dont think you have to be going to fast to do that much damage. 5 maybe 10MPH hitting steel and concrete. The next question is how the hell do you hit that at only 10 MPH?

If you forget you have 5ft of beak, then you'll be closer than you thinnk.

"Caution, objects in front of you may be closer than they appear." Hah.

Being very familiar with that stretch of water not sure how anyone could run over a buoy there ... very wide channel at that point (wide enough for very large commercial container ships, cruise ships, ferrys, nuclear powered attack subs with escorts, tall ships including the Coast Guard's Barque Eagle, to name a few, to navigate effortlessly)... lots of ambient light from Pfizer, EB, New London and Groton, as well as a full moon that night, and no fog or haze ... ? Just hope everyone is OK ... haven't read nor heard otherwise.

Used to do a ton of night time boating, many years a nightly ritual..

Damn near ran over a unlit kayaker a mile offshore in the Gulf on a clear night , never any boat traffic.

That was 15 years ago , before every other person now owns a standup paddle board.

Even on clear nights you can't take your eyes off the water in front of you , not to mention keeping a lookout for the stray idiot that might be running you down from astern or from your quarter.

Anything above minimal plane 15-20 is risky.

So you check the weekly notice to mariners everytime you go boating..?

I guess ICU's boat does...

It does not have radar and I don't check them. However if I had the same allision it would also be my fault. I run at night on plane because I know my area. I'm also going too fast for the conditions. Im not saying I or we all don't do it, purely stating it is self inflicted. If I hit something doing so it is solely my fault. That's all I'm saying.

Mine stay checked at work. We get them weekly. Charts are corrected by law for the commercial vessels.

We now have two post out of the last 5 or so that say "I run at night because I know my area". You all may recall the runabout that ran into a non-lighted temporary construction barge at night a while back and killed several people. This guy knew the area like the back of his hand too, but guess what, you never know when things change in that area you know so well.

I used to run at night all the time, but these day, I don't unless darkness sneaks up on me, and then, at idle or slow as possible.

I don't run at night much. I've had too many close calls where I'm moving along at minimum planing speed, which for me is around 12-15 with my tabs down. I've almost run over fishermen in unlit boats, canoes out in the dark in the middle of the lake and unlit pontoon boats with a bunch of teenagers. God forbid I ever kill someone and if I had a beer or 2 I'd be in jail! So I try to be back to my dock by dark. Just too many bad things. And then there's always the floating log in the dark or some other debris.

I grew up on big cruisers and we often traveled at night. But in a performance boat the problem is staying on plain at a slow speed.

As someone mentioned, your nav markers are listed on most all plotter maps. But that doesn't mean they are exactly where the plotter says. I was cruising the river one night just a mile from my house and saw something go by 3' off my starboard. Seems a barge had snagged one of the 3 red sand bar makers across from my house and it popped loose a half mile from where it belonged. Sure got my attention... I can't judge the operator on this one. Everyone walked away, so it falls under the "S__t Happens" category.

I'm likely going to add a FLIR system on my next boat. Checked them out at Miami show this year, and the range is up and prices way down. After running Lake Cumberland end to end on a moonless night couple years back with nothing more than the Navonics App, I'm all about high tech night vision on a boat.

Many years ago we decided to boat up to a fireworks show and watch from the river, after the show we headed back downriver to our dock and as we rounded the bend leaving town suddenly realized no moon tonight! :eek:
no problem we brought one of those million candle power lights . As we got farther from town it got darker and darker with very few lights near the shores. Had my wife up fron scanning back and forth with the light and very narrowly missed colliding with a huge basalt rock jutting out of the water . We new it was out there but couldn't see it at all , just the ripples on the water where it passes by. We wre at idle and it scared the chit out us !
last nite boating for us , as you might as well shined that light up you're butt.

The whole concept of relying on a chartplotter for night navigation is insane. I always wondered what kind of carnage would come from hitting a buoy like that. Now I know.:eek:

Love how people rush to judge without ANY facts.... he could have been running 100 MPH drunk,,,,, or just on plane and had a heart attack. Likely somewhere in between but " obviously self inflicted " is just an ignorant comment at this juncture.

I feel honored to be surrounded by such perfect individuals that could never possible make a mistake, or simply in the wrong place at the wrong time.

Feel free to bash me,,,,,its expected.

Took a ride today, this is the rock [ATTACH=CONFIG]556728[/ATTACH]

Turning on one of those spotlights at night is one of the worst things you can do. It destroys your night vision. You're far better off allowing your eyes to night adapt (~30mins). I've been out there on moonless nights before and its tempting to want to turn on a light, but that white light immediately erases your night adaptation, then you're stuck looking through a very short straw.

There is a small benefit of the chartplotter at night. If your gps leaves a bread crum trail and you've navigated that area before without hitting something, then you can follow the bread crum trail. But for navigating unfamiliar waters, yeah its useless lol.

Wait sorry, in the spirit of this thread: So you didn't consult your Nautical Almanac prior to going out that night!? What an idiot!! :)

[QUOTE=ToMorrow44;4452731]Turning on one of those spotlights at night is one of the worst things you can do. It destroys your night vision. You're far better off allowing your eyes to night adapt (~30mins). I've been out there on moonless nights before and its tempting to want to turn on a light, but that white light immediately erases your night adaptation, then you're stuck looking through a very short straw.

I totally understand what you are saying but out in the sticks where I live used to be very dark, and I'm kind of a fan of the that but out on the water when it's like being in a cave is a bit unnerving to say the least, let alone with a boat full of children.

Lol, not much nautical info in the middle of the desert. More so in the early 90s.
The new moon part, total fu on our part.

If my boat is in motion, my GPS is on, leaving breadcrumbs. You never know when you will need to navigate back safely, and/or more importantly; if someone else needs to navigate or drive back in an emergency. I just had THE 5 most important people in my life on a boat on Saturday night, and ran back from dinner on plane using GPS and tribal knowledge of the lake. Should I be keelhauled?

Yes, the OSO police will be looking for you.

How large are your umbrella policies,?

Those things get clipped alot, there are a few in the Maumee River in Toledo that I've come close to clipping myself.

A couple of years ago a guy at my marina clipped one, the lifting hook on the buoy peeled a big piece of glass off the side of the boat. The peeling hung out on the buoy for the rest of the season from what I recall...

I have boated in the same waters my entire life and still used breadcrumbs all the time as well because of the breakwall openings mostly. Great tool.

Well the guy ran over a buoy at 11:30 at night. He has to take the blame. The damn thing didn't jump out in front of him. Of course the chartplotter should be on, mine's always on unless I'm on the local pond, but that doesn't change the fact that the guy ran over a buoy at night. I do feel really bad for him; What an absolute nightmare that had to have been. Wow.

The probability of the Unforeseen happening, is directly related to the amount of Clear vision you have , multiplied by your speed.

I'll tell you a little story.

Back when I was in the parasailing business years ago . it's Spring Break and that is the same time the crabbers litter the water with crab pot bouys .

I am running 1500 feet off the beach in Naples pulling a flyer when out of the field of bouys I spot a head that belongs to some idiot doing the Crawl., missing him by 30 feet while doing 20 knots.

Soo after I get the flight ended. I go find this swimmer again.

He starts yelling at me that I almost ran him down. I said dude there is a no boats allowed Swim area out to 500 feet off the beach , why are you swimming 1500 feet off it

He yells it's his god given right to swim wherever he wants and if I run him over I am going to be to blame.

I try to explain to this idiot that his head looks just like the other 1000 crab pots in the 5 square miles we are in .

Also telling him the only reason I didn't run him over is because I keep a lookout for the bouys so I don't have to dive to clear the prop, unlike the other 200 newly arrived Spring Break crowd boats that are doing 50 mph running over them like their targets .

So this routine of his goes on for a week , I stay a mile off the beach now , accept on some rides where I assume he is not down that end of the beach.

Anyways out one beautiful flat calm day about 3 weeks after our 1st encounter.

Nice onshore breeze so I launch the people about A thousand feet off the beach because they had family watching on the beach.

Running along keeping an eye on the chute behind me for the 1st 100 feet going out, as I knew there were no other boats around.

Next thing I know I feel a reel long thunk and than a little roughness in the drivetrain. Suddenly the water behind the boat is dark red, like it just rained blood.

I get a Really sick feeling in my stomach, my Parasail boat is a inboard with 30 inches of prop and running gear hanging under it.

Run the ride for the 15 minutes. Just freaked out , but know with the pool of blood I just saw nothing lived through it.

I make a pass at the pool of blood on the way to drop the customers back off on the beach.

To my relief I had ran over a Giant Sea turtle, not my Idiot Swimmer.

Needless to say I didn't report the turtle either as the turtle Nazis would have burned my boat and me and every living relative and friend.

Now think about every Stoner you see driving around with a paddle board on their roof these days.

Seen many out off the beach after sunset down here. The boating laws don't pertain to them, they are free with Nature man.

Don't need no stinkin lights.

Just my 2cents

More than $1M.
Less than $5M.

wow, that had to scare the bejesus out of you!!

Scary part is that was back in my hard drinking hitting the bars every night days. Many days I couldn't blow triple Zeroes until noon.

Actually for about 2 years I think my bodies tare weight for alcohol was probably a .04 .

Worst injury I inflicted on anyone in 20 years and Tens of thousands of people flown was a stubbed toe.

Nothing like seeing a buoy go by your port side at about 40 knots . We've all been there . Or else you have not done enough boating. I can't imagine hitting one of those steelies the Sea lions lay on . Wow that's at tough thing to go through . Best wishes to the pilot

Are you talking about the incident in Peoria, IL? If so, that guy was smoked...his BAC via blood draw at the hospital after the accident was 0.157....

But of course all charges were dropped since he was a cop...uh..I mean since they couldn't prove he was driving the boat.

I'm thinking it was the incident on Lake St. Clair's Anchor Bay that killed 3 in 2008.

Hey bill text me about your 33 fountain ... 774 644 7882

i bought that pq the powertrain lives on in my 29 fountain and the interior lives on in a 24 outlaw the rest got sawzalled and now lives at the landfill and the pq had identical damage right down to the drive hanging off of it.the lads name was travis monster of a guy,he was holding wheel so hard when they hit he turned it into a pretzel.no
other injuries and they drove it to the launch.

It might be easiest to convert to 32’......