Intolerant1

From the limited amount of reading I have done regarding the HTM tradegy, I have noticed that the press has eluded to the fact that they were exceeding the speed limit. Without debating that issue, I will say that the press coverage of events like this serve to fuel the average "non-boating" citizens belief that laws to restrict our activity should be in place. The results, higher insurance rates, more speed limits, etc. Its an unfortunate situation and I'm not sure what or if an answer exists.

SHARKEY-IMAGES

It's my choice to wear the safety gear and hopefully it will remain that way. It seems that making anything mandatory, kind of makes people not want to do it because they are being told to. Anyway, let's hope alot more people use the common sense method. FAST BOATS require top of the line equipment. You spend so much $$$$$$$$ on the boat, don't go cheap on the SAFETY GEAR.

timewarp

I agree that we as operator(pilots?captains?) are responsible for the safety of our passengers and we need to be safe but I sure hope it doesn't come down to the government mandating us to wear safety equiptment.

I agee with Intolerant1,
It seems that the press and the Law enforcement officials are just going to blame the HTM tragedy on the fact that the boat was exceeding 35MPH because that was the speed limit of the lake.
I sure hope that a reason can be determined for what happened, after seeing the pictures of the boat and one engine it doesn't make any sense to me at all, I have seen alot of boats go over and very rarely is an engine completely torn from the boat, something would have to fail pretty bad.
I'm sorry if I got off topic, probably should have started a new thread, but it kind of seems to go here.
Caleb