heres an answer to some of our questions on this one.
Should have some pics soon from after the accident.


someone else will need to post them though for me.






This is a video of my boat accident on Lake Conroe in 1990. I was in the passenger seat on the left side of the boat. I broke through the windshield with my legs and hit the water at close to 70 mph with no lifejacket.

Jeff, I do have other photos right after the crash and am trying to find them. As you can see the boat was over trimmed and the tabs where too high which caused the boat to try a "GAINER". There were 3 of us in the boat. I was in the passenger seat and the other passenger was standing between the front seats (he hit the side of the boat so hard it broke his leg instantly). I hit the windshield with me knees on the way out and hit the water backwards at full speed (70mph). The driver was on the low side and the water scooped him out as well. Luckily we all ended up outside the boat because it stayed upside down for about 5-10 minutes before the heavy 502s started pulling it down perpendicular to the surface. The boat was about to disappear into 50 of water when a nearby houseboat tied a rope to the last few feet of visible bow and dragged the boat to shallow water where is sank. Mark



Hes a real cool guy to furnish us guys wondering with this info on the accident.

could help us all not see the same fate.

That is on my home lake with my boating club. Everytime someone asks what kind of boat I have I get to hear all about the accident again. Kind of annoying cause everybody around here thinks that Sutphens are unsafe because of it. People that know better know they are great boats but the people who know little and know about the accident give me $hit all the time.

After the radar run every year they would head back to where it started and the radar boat (usually a big cruiser or house boat) would run back on half plane. Someone would be videoing the boats on their way home jumping its wake. Needless to say, after that year they did not do it anymore.

That cant help sell sutphens on the lake thats for sure.

What crappy luck it could happen to any boat

Yeah, but how many Top Gun's have ended up in the trees?

Tickfaw 200....sort off.....a few years back...

The bottom line is, don't let anyone run your boat at speed.

:party-smiley-004:

with the wrong driver, wrong conditions, or just crap luck, any boat can be a "bad" boat

If something broke it would be bad luck.

The rest is up to who is in control of the boat.

luckystrike, thats harsh statement.

I mean how many times have we seen profesional boat racers turn them upside down or stuff them.

Those guys, I am sure are some good drivers but even they have the bad luck bug hit them.

No ones perfect.

So in my opinion even the best can likely have bad luck without breaking any parts.

Of course I am a novice so I could be wrong.

I still have trouble with chine walk.LOL