Power boat drivers: wear your kill cord

Originally posted by pondmonkey According the Director of Internet Pimping for Star-Borg Windsurfing, Grumpf doesn't actually windsurf anymore.

According the Director of Internet Pimping for Star-Borg Windsurfing, Grumpf doesn't actually windsurf anymore.

Originally posted by transient Originally posted by iGRF There is a delightful anarchy about boats and boating and long may it last, The anarchy you talk about is appealing but does it really exist within dinghy or yacht sailing? Those of us who belong to sailing clubs are required to be insured. If the standard of our sailing was a danger to ourselves or others the senior instructor would no doubt ask us to attend some training. The anarchy you talk about exists with windsurfing, surfing, BMXing, skateboarding etc and I definitely think it's great for pushing boundaries (these folk are only a danger to themselves generally)......but not in club sailing, the anarchy has gone.....I have no problem if those who are not affiliated to a club are forced to play by the same rules as us. As for the freedom to jump into a mega horsepower meat mincer and carve up the coast with the potential to kill someone else without insurance or training......well, I don't actually want that kind of freedom. I understand why some folk do though.

Originally posted by alstorer (though Scottish access laws would be better),

Again if you're the responsible type, which to a large extent Darwin decrees amongst those who would go to 'the sea in ships' since for a large part the sea very quickly punishes the stupid, then Insurance becomes mandatory simply because of the necessity when in Marina's because of the potential interaction with other craft/third party liability etc.
I recall even as a young irresponsible water skier back in the early seventies, before we took up competition, we were all insured, even the drug runners, because of the high risk of loss in the Channel (high speed terminal nose dives were a bit of an issue).
Now and again you'd get the morons turning up in their baths (quite literally tin baths with an outboard) on some stupid cross channel bid that wouldn't be, but someone would generally have a word with them, like that t**t that tried to circumnavigate Sheppey thinking it was the UK, I bet he wasn't insured, but then there's no charge for rescue either, by and large it is a volunteer operation.

There is a delightful anarchy about boats and boating and long may it last, inland things are different, a lot easier to patrol and police, the Norfolk broads was the first place I experienced and had to pay a license and have a number stuck on my windsurfer for, I never went back there. I also had the ludicrous irony despite having an offshore powerboat license and having campaigned all over the UK and Cross Channel events, of having to sit the RYA Power or Safetyboat 2 test. I did in fact point out to them at the time it was full of potential safety issues, this, just in order to take a rib onto Roadford reservoir during a kids windsurfing rally which my three were attending, never went back there either.
The sea is the only totally free place on the planet, hence why I like to spend so much time on it, not that it stops the odd Range boat shouting the odds at you if you stray to close to the ranges, I wonder how Insurance cover stacks up against being shot.

Edited by iGRF - 21 May 13 at 8:43am