This. It would make no difference IMO.Originally Posted by Mark Perry
This. It would make no difference IMO.
Most people that drive vehicles have a license but they still can't drive worth a flip!!! Not sure a boat license would be any different
David Blanton
Anglers Choice Pro Staff
Stratos 201XLE
Tournament Director / Warriors on the Water
Va requires it and I promise it makes no damn difference the class is a joke
Oklahoma has on also but I never made my son take the class. He operates the boat at lower safer speeds then I do.
I took mine, there should be no “grandfathered” in. Often times it’s the older generation in luxury boats cutting me off, passing me on plane too close while fishing, passing on the wrong side ect ect
It would make no difference. If anything like around here, there's nobody to enforce it. We went to Crab Island and then up in Harbor Walk marina today and the amount of people that can't read the "Idle Speed Only" signs is astounding. There was one FWC boat cruising around and two sheriff's boats covering way too much water. Jet skis running wild, I actually say two young girls on a jet ski taking selfies while cruising around.
Need to have more enforcement on the water. How many times have you been on the water and never saw the a warden?
The VA test is pretty good, I took it last year and was impressed. We had two ladies almost get run over while they were paddle boarding on SML last summer. Kind of hard to miss two people standing up on a paddle board.
2018 Ranger RT188 SC Black/115 hp Yamaha SHO 4-stroke; Garmin LVS34 - north
2018 Ranger RT188 DC Black/115 hp Merc Pro XS 4-stroke; Garmin LVS34 - south
14' Mirrorcraft tin boat (ancient) with a 9.9 Mercury 4-stroke, no electronics; catches fish anyway
As mentioned before, Alabama has one but I can assure you there are just as many idiots behind a wheel of a boat. Going down the lake drinking their beer and not having a care in the world as to what is in front of them. The five trillion owners of Pontoon Boats who seem to think that they need to drive between a fisherman and the bank in a twenty foot section is the correct way to drive.
A boating license or certificate IMHO has nothing to do about making you a safe operator. I got mine a few months ago because it is required in Virginia. My 23 year old daught took it a month ago because of the cutoff date she is required to have one in Pa.
The strongest point of the material is centered around pfd's, and other related safety concerns. That is not a bad thing. However the other parts are lacking in preparing a new operator. Passing and obtaining the license/certificate alone does not qualify you to operate a boat.
Now combine laws, safety, rules of the water and add driving experience then you are on the right track.
Have been teaching my daughter how to handle my bass boat. I expect it will take her most of the summer for me to let her take it by herself. The biggest problem is the simple fact people don't follow or maybe know simple things such as how to pass, who has the right of way etc. Maybe they don't care. We have all seen it, it happens every trip on the water.
The important thing is age has nothing to do with being able to safely operated a boat. It is a combination of knowing the rules and experience operating a boat. Understanding simple things like how a boat stops must be learned by experience. The worst accidents I have seen involve jet skies. Yes they have the license / certificate but don't remember they loose their ability to steer when you it the power.
However if there was one law I could add it would be this. PFD'S would be mandated to be fluorescent orange for anyone in the water such as skiers, tubers, jet skiers etc. It is so hard to see someone in the water when they are wearing a dark colored PFD.
I also would like to see more law enforcement on the water, not just checking for fishing license either.
I want to habe fun on the water and not spend the majority of the time getting out of the way of people that are going to get me killed.
True story...figured that out the first time I went to Smith mt... mercy
2020 Skeeter ZX150
Problem is there are very few and even those handful are expensive
2020 Skeeter ZX150
Here on the Mississippi River as well. Hell 3' is deep.Running 1-3’ of water on the Arkansas river is normal
You need to be 18 I believe to drive a water craft here .. go to any lake and there are 12 year olds flying around the lakes on jet skis
My favorite lake to fish I won’t even fish again until the end of September unless it’s raining .. it’s so out of control fish and game and the local police admit they are afraid to go and enforce the law .. riots would start after writing the first ticket
Had a BBC member with me one day and he was driving my boat onto the trailer for me.. he was 5 feet from the trailer when a jet ski drove full speed between the boat and the trailer
Laws won’t do a thing when no one will enforce them
I had enough incidents this weekend alone to make me a proponent of boating licenses. One in particular was the worst. I was in an area with a marked channel that you cannot run outside of as it's a no wake zone. These markers were on my starboard side and I was running maybe 50 ft off of them to start. A pontoon boat is headed directly at me so I correct to starboard. This boat corrects the same direction. I correct to starboard again. AGAIN, this boat corrects the same direction and the guy driving the boat throws his arms up. I have no more room to maneuver without going into the no wake area and you never correct to port in a head on situation so I just stopped the boat. The only sure way to eliminate confusion on the water is to just stop. The guy driving the pontoon boat then corrects to my port and passes 15 ft off my boat screaming at me to watch where I'm going. He proceeds to go around me and then cut through the no wake zone on plane.
I had my wife and 2 yr old on the boat. Would a license have helped in this situation? I don't know. It wouldn't have hurt though.
A law and or boat training might not stop the crazies but it will remove the "ignorance" defense
Dale Sinclair original
It's not really intended to be smart ass, but an observation.
EVERY time I was on the water in Virginia, on a relatively uncrowded lake (compared to Smith Mountain Lake, at least), there was some kind of incident where ignorance was in full display. I've had wake boats nearly throw me up onto the bank, from coming within 15ft while throwing a 4' wave. I've had to shut down while running 30-40ft off a cliff to my starboard side, when another boater approached nearly head on from my port side and cut in front between me and the cliff. I've been fishing down a main lake bank to a hard, high point at the mouth of a creek, when boats have almost collided because both were cutting the blind corner at 50+mph. Every year, it seemed there were accidents at night where one boat ran OVER TOP of another in the dark - one at a speed too high for the conditions, the other (or both) with no lights.
Some folks are idiots behind the wheel of a car. But it goes to a whole new level on the water. Licensing the boaters seems to have helped little, imo. The few times I've sounded my horn to pass from behind, I was greeted with a middle finger. Pretty safe bet those people had no idea those were signals to alert which side I would be passing on.
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"If God had intended us to drink beer, He would have given us stomachs."
-David Daye
So there's no stumps on the old creek channels???... Logs don't sink in the creek channels and create unseen hazards???... Come on up and I'll show you some unmarked stumps (that are just under the surface) in creek mouths where when you run in you pass within a couple of feet and if you hesitate you'll be pushing your boat off muck and sand... Maps are worthless, the bodies of water change every year. That's why they put in bold print This map is not to be used for navigational purposes...
I spend a lot of time in Tennessee where if you were born on or after 1/1/89, and in Ohio if your born on or after 1/1/82 you need a license to operate a watercraft. Ohio and Tennessee boaters are no better than Indiana or Kentucky operators... Here's the way to look at it... Until the figure out a way to "paint lines" on water, float stop signs and traffic lights it's best to drive defensively... Dan
Exactly the problem. They had questions about returning from sea navigating inter-coastal waterways... I know the Tennessee River eventually reaches the Gulf, but let's be real. Teach the basics and you'll get a lot more people willing to take boaters courses... Dan
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