I thought i'd share a story with you about me loosing my boat on the interstate 6 years ago in hopes that someone may learn from my mistakes.
My wife and I, she was my girlfriend at the time, were headed back from a day of boating. I was on a major interstate and approaching a major interchange. It was 4:30 PM on a Friday and traffic was thick but flowing. We were clipping along when my wife screamed, "THE BOAT!!!!". I looked in the rear view and to my disbelief, the boat was about 100 yards behind me, sliding and skipping down the interstate and crossing lanes of traffic. The cars and trucks were everywhere doing their best to dodge the boat and each other. I immediately swerved to the shoulder, slammed on the breaks and slammed it in reverse. I heard a crunch and a smash. It was the trailer! I wrapped the trailer around the truck breaking the tounge! This all happened so fast that I thought the boat and trailer were still attached and of course, you cant see the trailer in the rear view unless the boat is on it. I straightened the truck out and jumped out. By this time the boat had come to a rest in the middle of the 4 lanes and traffic was at a stand still. Thank God, there were no accidents. Although, I had sucessfully shut down I-10 East, west bound lanes, two exits before I-610, at 4:30pm on a Friday. I ran to my boat, a big 16' McKee foam filled fiberglass w/115 Evinrude, and pushed as hard as I could trying to get the thing off the interstate so traffic could go. No luck the boat was too heavy. I waved my hand to the line of stopped vehicles for help and about 16 prople came running up, included in the croud were a couple of EMT's who were making sure everyone was ok. The crowd all gathered around the boat and pushed, the same time they began to push, I had just put my hands on the boat to begin pushing and the boat suddenly moved from under me and I fell and put this horrible huge spot of road rash on my knee. So now Im in pain and bleeding all over myself. Once the boat was on the shoulder, I thanked everyone and suggested that they get moving. All returned to their vehicles and traffic cleared out pretty quickly. I pulled to a gas station, called a roll back wrecker and had him pick the boat up from the pavement and drop it in my driveway. The boat set for a couple of months before it was repaired. We took it out one more time and it acted up pretty bad on us, so we decided that day it was gone. We sold it. We think the boat was cursed.
The reason the boat fell off the trailer was my inexperience. The wench strap was old and snapped and I had no other straps rigged up to secure the boat.
We were very lucky that no one was injured in this. It could have easily been a life altering experience. When I think about this incident and what could have happened, it makes me kringe. Today, I am very paranoid when pulling my boat. The first thing I replaced when I bought this boat was a new wench strap. Besides the winch, I have three other straps holding the boat down. I check the straps and check the straps again.
Also as a result of this Im not comfortable with riding close behind people pulling boats, and I hate it when people tailgate me. I know first hand that bad #### can happen.
Enjoy your boat outings, but don't cut any corners when trailering.
Straps are cheap!!
My wife and I, she was my girlfriend at the time, were headed back from a day of boating. I was on a major interstate and approaching a major interchange. It was 4:30 PM on a Friday and traffic was thick but flowing. We were clipping along when my wife screamed, "THE BOAT!!!!". I looked in the rear view and to my disbelief, the boat was about 100 yards behind me, sliding and skipping down the interstate and crossing lanes of traffic. The cars and trucks were everywhere doing their best to dodge the boat and each other. I immediately swerved to the shoulder, slammed on the breaks and slammed it in reverse. I heard a crunch and a smash. It was the trailer! I wrapped the trailer around the truck breaking the tounge! This all happened so fast that I thought the boat and trailer were still attached and of course, you cant see the trailer in the rear view unless the boat is on it. I straightened the truck out and jumped out. By this time the boat had come to a rest in the middle of the 4 lanes and traffic was at a stand still. Thank God, there were no accidents. Although, I had sucessfully shut down I-10 East, west bound lanes, two exits before I-610, at 4:30pm on a Friday. I ran to my boat, a big 16' McKee foam filled fiberglass w/115 Evinrude, and pushed as hard as I could trying to get the thing off the interstate so traffic could go. No luck the boat was too heavy. I waved my hand to the line of stopped vehicles for help and about 16 prople came running up, included in the croud were a couple of EMT's who were making sure everyone was ok. The crowd all gathered around the boat and pushed, the same time they began to push, I had just put my hands on the boat to begin pushing and the boat suddenly moved from under me and I fell and put this horrible huge spot of road rash on my knee. So now Im in pain and bleeding all over myself. Once the boat was on the shoulder, I thanked everyone and suggested that they get moving. All returned to their vehicles and traffic cleared out pretty quickly. I pulled to a gas station, called a roll back wrecker and had him pick the boat up from the pavement and drop it in my driveway. The boat set for a couple of months before it was repaired. We took it out one more time and it acted up pretty bad on us, so we decided that day it was gone. We sold it. We think the boat was cursed.
The reason the boat fell off the trailer was my inexperience. The wench strap was old and snapped and I had no other straps rigged up to secure the boat.
We were very lucky that no one was injured in this. It could have easily been a life altering experience. When I think about this incident and what could have happened, it makes me kringe. Today, I am very paranoid when pulling my boat. The first thing I replaced when I bought this boat was a new wench strap. Besides the winch, I have three other straps holding the boat down. I check the straps and check the straps again.
Also as a result of this Im not comfortable with riding close behind people pulling boats, and I hate it when people tailgate me. I know first hand that bad #### can happen.
Enjoy your boat outings, but don't cut any corners when trailering.
Straps are cheap!!
