Powell near disaster, highly stupid behavior

[anyfishlldo]

One of the guys that works for me came in today after returning from a long weekend @ Powell and was a little shaken up.

He went down with family who has a houseboat and several people brought runabouts. Ended up being very glad he wasn't letting his 16 y.o. stepson hang out with the older cousins.

Two nephews, 24 and 26 I think, decided to take a couple friends and their girlfriends on a 1 AM booze cruise in an open bow smaller boat, got lost and disoriented (hmmm, wonder how that happened) and turned up the wrong inlet. Oh yeah, no lights either.

Result: 40 MPH collision with some good old solid Wingate sandstone, one buddy thrown 40 feet or so onto rock , broken elbow there(thankfully wearing a vest, but the only one doing so), another with broken wrist and dislocated shoulder, two girls with stitches, one quite a few on the face, and a couple of guys with fractured ribs etc. Driver of the boat supposedly woke up UNDER the engine cover after impact. Totalled boat that still had a $11K note on it, and apparently: lapsed insurance!

Luckily some folks on a houseboat nearby heard the collision and went to help and some of them were EMT's.

Guy that works for me said they woke up next AM and the kids were still gone and they got worried, then the Ranger's boat comes rolling up and the brother in law about lost it (can't blame him) wanting to know where his boys were. Everybody released from hospital and relatively OK.



Just to clarify, the parents were not at fault here. Boat belonged to (sort of) grown kids.

 

[jtexas]

Re: Powell near disaster, highly stupid behavior

That's a life-changing event all right. Any criminal charges?

Question: if you don't insure your car, the lender acquires the most expensive policy available (covering only their own interest of course) and charges it back to you...is that not also true of boat loans?

 

[anyfishlldo]

Re: Powell near disaster, highly stupid behavior

No charges as of yet, and in most cases they do put "force placed" ins. on you in that situation, but sometimes it takes the lender some time to figure out your lapse and get the process going.

At this point I'm guessing the kid would be pretty grateful if they have done it, cover some medical and the boat.

And from all reports from family this was a huge wake-up call for this kid, and he does seem to get the severity of it.


But still. I hope it causes him a lot of sleepless nights and deep thinking. Lives were almost lost here.




EDIT: Reckless boating charges filed.

 

[rottenray6402]

Re: Powell near disaster, highly stupid behavior

It sounds like they were really lucky to come out of that with no one killed! Hopefully he learned his lesson from this.

 

[Ron Everson]

Re: Powell near disaster, highly stupid behavior

I never did understand all of those boats I see at night running up and down the main channel late at night in the Hall's Crossing area of Powell. When it's dark, I'm tied up for the night. Too many big, mean rocks on that lake. Glad for no fatalities in that one. A hard lesson learned.

Ron

 

[DWEBSTER]

Re: Powell near disaster, highly stupid behavior

When I was a kid, our family used to vacation on Lake Powell, a large reservoir on the Colorado River north of the Grand Canyon. We would load up the cabin curser with a week’s worth of groceries and work our way 100 miles up river, slowly exploring the multiple and varied of side canyons along the way.

One evening, we tied up for the night against a particularly seep canyon wall. After supper, my father developed the urge to climb this wall. He merely stepped off the boat onto the wall and began working his way up along the broken rock edges. I stayed on the boat, watching him in wonder.

My father did not look down until he had secured himself on a ledge, about 30 or 40 feet above our boat. Then, he panicked. He realized that that one misstep on the way down would result in his falling onto his boat and his family!

So he called for me to climb up after him, bringing with me the anchor rope, the ax and the largest screwdriver in the tool box. He laid on the ledge, coaching me up the rock wall with the requested supplies. He then used the ax to pound the screwdriver into a large crack behind his ledge while I tied the rope around my waist, using a knot that I had learned in Boy Scouts but have long since forgotten. He sat on the ledge and handled the rope, while I rappelled back down to the boat.

Then my father tied the other end of our anchor rope around his waist and looped the rope around the screwdriver in the crack. My mother and I stood on the back deck, holding our end of the rope with all our might, knowing that our combined weight was about equal to my father’s weight. Nobody knew if the screwdriver/pulley would hold, but it did. We safely lowered my father back to our boa, and then retrieved the anchor rope. For all I know, his best screwdriver is still stuck in that rock, about ½ way up the canyon wall.