just missed that bouy

[ziggy]

hi folks. i been boatin for years on lakes. but rivers are still new to me and are much more exciting. (dangerous that is) while boatin yesterday on the missouri i was just floating and enjoying the day. ya sure do have to watch where yer going even then i find. i'm floating twards a bouy, watching it pretty close, though lackidazeicaly. next thing i know i am right on top of it. no time for 4 min. with the blower . get it started and into fwd. asap. just missed it by feet to the front side of it. the current took me right straight into it. i missed it but i can't think by much. i wonder what keeps those bouy markers planted so well on the bottom of a river with pretty swift current? i'm thinking a cable tied to a large weight of some kind. man, if thats the case, surely i just missed that cable or chain too. whew.... that'll teach me to watch, at least i did miss it. but surely would have hit it in seconds if i had not got right on to it. sure is fun to keep getting educated (w/o consiquenses).

 

[dtherrien]

Re: just missed that bouy

Yeah big rivers can be challanging to boat on.I grew up on the st.lawrence river and go there a couple of times a year for fishing.It is weired when you go from an area that is 5miles wide down to an area that is 1mile wide....you can feel that current when you travel through that area....feels like your boat is shifting from side to side.

 

[rebars1]

Re: just missed that bouy

Hey! Luckily, that old Trisonic still has a bit life in it!

 

[txswinner]

Re: just missed that bouy

Would have been like hitting a dock depending on your speed. Voice of experience.

 

[Triton II]

Re: just missed that bouy

The high tide time at our river ramp is 3 hours behind the high tide time at the heads of Botany Bay. The low tide times are the same. Our ramp is 9nms upriver from the Bay. So, it takes 9 hours from low to high tide at the ramp, therefore a piece of driftwood would take 9 hours to cover 9nms. That makes the average upstream tidal current one knot. It only takes 3 hours for that water to flow back downhill to the Bay giving it an average tidal current speed of 3 knots. You should see the carnage at the ramp one and a half hours after high tide when the tide is at its fastest!

 

[Capt Joe]

Re: just missed that bouy

Triton II, Try those figures on a bay 7 times the size of Sydney harbour & with a tidal change of up to 8 metres. (Darwin Harbour)<br /><br />10 knots & going nowhere

 

[ziggy]

Re: just missed that bouy

wow guys, that tidal change really sounds exciteing. man that's about 11.5 mph. river only runs maybe 3-5 mph. hope to someday exiperience the rigors of some real open water. man if ya hit a bouy at that speed ya'd have a hole in your boat. bet it would be fun docking too. i had more fun that day after missing the bouy. ran into a lot of rain with high wind gusts. i judged the weather incorrectly and had to wait in the driveing rain for a good half hour against the current while i waited for others to put in. at least i had my convertible top up. unlike most of the others at the ramp that day hideing under their beach towels. dtherrien, i hear ya about the current just moving yer hole boat sideways. i had some of that too when i was running at near wot trying to beat the rain, which i didn't do. the whole boat just shifts sideways from the back and yer on a new corse, fun. the final fun of that day was loadin the boat on the trailer crooked. i didn't straighten it out as others needed the ramp too. least i didn't damage my 'ol trisonic. got it loaded back straight now. i needed a reason to go to the lake ya know.

 

[timothyl]

Re: just missed that bouy

Hey this is a long time in coming, but just seen the post. <br /> Those bouys are held in place by a 2-3 thousand pound concrete "sinker" and 65 feet of either 3/8" or 1/2" steel cable. I have set thousands of these during my service in the Coast Guard when I was working the Tennessee, Cumberland, and Mississippi Rivers

 

[ziggy]

Re: just missed that bouy

tlands, thanks for the info. i figured it had to be some pretty heavy wieght to (mostly)hold those bouys in place against all the current and boat traffic. reason i was wondering about the leangth of the cable is that i was wondering how much danger zone in front of a bouy is. where the cable would be 3' deep would have snaged my prop. with 65' of cable and a river that's 15 or so ft. deep. i aint gonna do the figures but got to think that 10' or so in front of the bouy would be to close. i was too close...man that'd have really ruined my day snaggin a 1/2" cable......i hope i learned my lesson and don't repeat that lackidazeical behavior. . thanks

 

[malagaoth]

Re: just missed that bouy

here-a-bouts they use chain as it goes straight down. the ones to watch are crab pots! often the float is only an old gallon oil container that is connected to the pot using 1/2inch agricultural rope and plenty of it!!!! at low water there can be yards of the stuff just below the surface. and of course they move every few days so you never really know where they are.

 

[SeaMasterZ@aol.com]

Re: just missed that bouy

I have it on good authority that a stainless prop will usually cut a crab pot rope, im not sure of the exact quote but it was along the lines of, if you are moving too fast to avoid the crab pot, the stainless wheel will make confetti out of it<br /><br />usually that is ... <br /><br />MY luck, id hit a cable! <br /><br />