Close call!

[218_fishing]

Well that was close.

[basshammerwannabe]

Bass Boats don't have brakes and other's not paying attention leads to bad results.

yep... thats why you have to watch out for everyone else and get out of the way if need be

[basshammerwannabe]

The two idiots could have killed somebody.
No different than stopping on a major 70 mph highway.
Same exact thing.

except brake lights

[Whistler]

Guys almost get run over, and the response is "don't stop there"? See, we have big problems.

I couldn't agree with you any more BigFishSteve. You are spot on and with the thinking that seems to be pervasive here, we do "have big problems".

[Houndsman]

I agree the boat that almost ran them over was 100 percent at fault

[darryl1966]

unless you are broke down , I would never stop in the direct path of the group blasting off , you should have motored over to the side and then came back after the boat traffic stopped , Blast of are the most dangerous time of a tournament , especially now that folks are running 16 inch graphs on the dash , sometimes 2 , it certianly obstructs your vision ,

[250bassFL]

I agree the boat that almost ran them over was 100 percent at fault

+1

[catchatoad]

There were at least three boats running the same line and the one in the middle shuts down...
My questions is, would they have shut down there if there was thick fog?

[BigFishSteve]

My question is, maybe they can stop and fish there since they got there first, and expect the other boats to not hit them.

Did I miss the fog in the video?

[Rider99XX]

unless you are broke down , I would never stop in the direct path of the group blasting off , you should have motored over to the side and then came back after the boat traffic stopped , Blast of are the most dangerous time of a tournament , especially now that folks are running 16 inch graphs on the dash , sometimes 2 , it certianly obstructs your vision ,

Motoring over to the side can get you run over just as fast as stopping because you are cutting across the other boats path and most boat drivers tend to slow down some when making a turn.

[BigFishSteve]

I didn't hear any horns when over-taking either.

[ECobb91]

Both at fault.

Boat driver in front shares some responsibility. He should’ve looked back to see if he would be impeding anyone following.

boat that almost hit them is even more at fault for not moving over sooner, who knows what he was occupied with, sure wasn’t looking where he was going.

there was about 10 seconds from when the lead boat started slowing down to when the boat passed. 60mph is about 88ft/s. Meaning the boat tailing would be about 880ft behind the boat that stopped… and almost another 150ft more at 70mph, nearly 1/6 mile behind the lead boat. Human reaction time is about 1.5 seconds (assuming same as driving reaction time). That means the tailing boat had approx. 8.5 seconds and about 700ft (more than two football fields) to change course… Plenty of time to move over and slow down.

[Rider99XX]

Both at fault.

Boat driver in front shares some responsibility. He should’ve looked back to see if he would be impeding anyone following.

boat that almost hit them is even more at fault for not moving over sooner, who knows what he was occupied with, sure wasn’t looking where he was going.

there was about 10 seconds from when the lead boat started slowing down to when the boat passed. 60mph is about 88ft/s. The boat tailing would be about 880ft behind the boat that stopped… at 60mph, and almost another 150ft more at 70. nearly 1/6 mile behind. Human reaction time is about 1.5 seconds (assuming same as driving reaction time). That means the tailing boat had approx. 8.5 seconds and about 700ft (more than two football fields) to change course… Plenty of time to move over and slow down.

Correct.

[BigFishSteve]

Like the Smith driving system bullet points: Always Leave Your Self a Hypotenuse.

[marshman]

Situational awareness fail here….. by both drivers…..come on man, always know what’s behind you..especially if you’re about to shut down… I understand following riding in another boats wake but that was a little close…

[BigFishSteve]

If we slow that down, I wonder if we can see the other driver hit the waypoint button?

[Squire]

I have had numerous boats stop in front of me at speed. If you are paying attention and you have the right spacing, it is not an issue. You have to expect the boat in front of you to do anything at any moment because while you can see them, they can't see you. In this video, the OP says they reached the offshore spot they wanted to fish, so bad on the boater following them in EITHER case. As a comment, one thing I do in these mass launch situations is pull over on the side to idle out to the offshore spot or I circle and do a 270 degree turn as I don't naturally trust everyone to be paying attention and know the spot I want to fish.

[marshman]

I’m always the slow boat on the water anywhere I go so I’ve always been in the habit of paying attention to what’s behind me… If I gotta turn and someone is anywhere in sight behind me I hand signal just like on a bicycle…. But that’s me. Them young kids driving $80K boats are scary..

[jigheadworm]

Our club along with several Tournaments around here have went to honor starts best thing we could have ever done.

[Tone357]

I wonder if the brand of trolling motor could have had something to do with it. This is a screen capture just as the trailing boat came into the frame. Most trolling motors have a high profile except the Power Pole that can obscure your vision.