menzies
Guru
Last edited:
Jupiter Inlet Boat Sinking
- Thread starter menzies
- Start date
The friendliest place on the web for anyone who enjoys boating.
If you have answers, please help by responding to the unanswered posts.
If you have answers, please help by responding to the unanswered posts.
caltexflanc
Guru
Going way too fast. Single handling and no PFD it looks like(?) . Lucky guy there were folks around to help. And the comment about trimming is a bad one, never trim in a following sea. Maybe this guy had tabs down as well; looks like it.
twistedtree
Guru
Wow, someone just happened to be filming him with a drone right overhead as he was coming in when this happened? What are the chances? Zero to one?
CPseudonym
Moderator Emeritus
One of the comments addressed that there is a guy that flies his drone over Jupiter Inlet every time the weather gets nasty.
He's probably got a thousand videos of boats running it that didn't sink.
jacquesm
Veteran Member
Yes, that's a theory around here: some people think that the boat was taking water. It would explain the sudden bow down move, surface effect, water sloshing in the bilges.
caltexflanc
Guru
Be interesting what the skipper has to say. I tend to think he had the trim tabs all the way down and was going too fast, but like everyone else, that's speculation at this point.
OP
OP
menzies
Guru
They are going to have to recover it from the inlet as it will be a hazard leaving it there. So they will know re the trim tabs.
Fletcher500
Guru
Is this one of those low draft boats used for fly fishing in shallow waters? center consoles normally have more free board, at least the ones I am familiar with. It went under amazingly quick.
I have not been on a CC in many years, but I don't recall them having much of a bilge area to collect a large amount of water to cause that.
It looks more like a swamp and fill due to the low freeboard.
I have not been on a CC in many years, but I don't recall them having much of a bilge area to collect a large amount of water to cause that.
It looks more like a swamp and fill due to the low freeboard.
Nomad Willy
Guru
Maybe someone talked him into an all chain rode and bigger is better.
ksanders
Moderator Emeritus
I agree with what others have said...
His bow sure seems to be down, and or he was going way too fast and buried the bow.
The whole concept of open type, especially low freeboard skiffs in sea conditions scares me. Yes I know they do it, and yes I see them every day, but they scare me. One mistake, bury the bow and the result is a unrecoverable situation.
His bow sure seems to be down, and or he was going way too fast and buried the bow.
The whole concept of open type, especially low freeboard skiffs in sea conditions scares me. Yes I know they do it, and yes I see them every day, but they scare me. One mistake, bury the bow and the result is a unrecoverable situation.
Bow should have been much higher. Suspect he must have taken a few over the side before hitting the standing waves.
Entering inlets can be exciting. Trawler simply doesn't have the power to ride the back of a wave. Frantic movements of the wheel from one stop to the other, and then once through a wink to the mate "a bit bumpy back there..."
kthoennes
Guru
- Joined
- Oct 11, 2013
- Messages
- 2,473
- Location
- USA
- Vessel Name
- Xanadu
- Vessel Make
- Mainship 37 Motor Yacht
I'm surprised swamping the bow doesn't happen more often, particularly to go-fast open bow runabouts. Our marina slip has a straight line of sight to the marina's launching ramp. We sit on the aft deck, five to six feet above the waterline, and watch families load up the bow seating area with so many people that the bow ring for the trailer retrieval dips underwater and the leading edge of the bow is about a foot off the water. Then they roar out to the river on a rough, windy day with 3-5' seas. Boat manufacturers even design bows to incline downward, making the likelihood of swamping even worse. I always assumed that profile was to improve line of sight when you're flying at high speeds pulling skiers and the bow rises, but unless you're flying, it seems to me that really increases the risk of digging the bow into a wave at slow speeds in rough water. (This one happens to be a Cobalt but I just grabbed it as a random example.) I don't get it.
Attachments
Benthic2
Guru
I don't think these boats are made for taking water over the bow. I use to run a 17 foot bowrider that didn't even have scuppers. Any water in the boat had to get pumped out by the bilge pump, and that just has a manual switch...no water senser/float switch, etc.
OldDan1943
Guru
- Joined
- Oct 2, 2017
- Messages
- 10,595
- Location
- USA
- Vessel Name
- Kinja
- Vessel Make
- American Tug 34 #116 2008
See what happens when you get ahead of the wave?
Last edited:
markpierce
Master and Commander
- Joined
- Sep 25, 2010
- Messages
- 12,557
- Location
- USA
- Vessel Name
- Carquinez Coot
- Vessel Make
- penultimate Seahorse Marine Coot hull #6
I avoid videos that ask one to sign in.
ksanders
Moderator Emeritus
You are pointing downhill.
Then when you hit the bottom of the wave, of you have little freeboard, and or little reserve buoyancy the bow goes under. (This can happen to any boat if the waves are close enough together BTW)
In a open boat it happens just like in the video. Water comes over the bow filling the boat.
That was my other first thought-that it looked like a bay boat hull, instead of an offshore deep vee. They are popular for fishing the flats, around where I live, and have very little draft, but it's no fun to be in one in any kind of sea.
Both my boats are deep vees, and while you can poop them, it's pretty hard to stuff the bow if they are trimmed right.
psneeld
Guru
Something else going on.
Looked very low in the water and a little sluggish as if the boat had water below the decks. CCs usually are self draining and only a fool would run the breaking inlet ankle deep in water.
Not a flats boat...usually they have small cockpits for this very reason. Looked low sided, like some of the old Aquasport boats, but could have just looked that way from water inside or the way it was riding from trim in general.
Would guess the tabs were down, but if there was water in the boat, the tab thing is most likely less relavent ...but again would show questionable seamanship in those conditions.
One thing, looked like the length of the boat was exactly wrong for the period and size of the waves. The stern still was elevated as the tip of the bow was in the back of the front wave. The buoyancy of the bow wasnt enough at that point to lift the foredeck out of the wave in front. Had a 26 Shamrock do that a couple times, but I had the tabs up, little water in the bilge and the Shammie bow has a lot more buoyancy.
Not hard to submarine a boat like the video, but not all that common either.
Looked very low in the water and a little sluggish as if the boat had water below the decks. CCs usually are self draining and only a fool would run the breaking inlet ankle deep in water.
Not a flats boat...usually they have small cockpits for this very reason. Looked low sided, like some of the old Aquasport boats, but could have just looked that way from water inside or the way it was riding from trim in general.
Would guess the tabs were down, but if there was water in the boat, the tab thing is most likely less relavent ...but again would show questionable seamanship in those conditions.
One thing, looked like the length of the boat was exactly wrong for the period and size of the waves. The stern still was elevated as the tip of the bow was in the back of the front wave. The buoyancy of the bow wasnt enough at that point to lift the foredeck out of the wave in front. Had a 26 Shamrock do that a couple times, but I had the tabs up, little water in the bilge and the Shammie bow has a lot more buoyancy.
Not hard to submarine a boat like the video, but not all that common either.
Last edited:
Dougcole
Guru
No it is not a flats skiff. It's an center console built for offshore/nearshore fishing. Much, much bigger than a flats boat and much heavier.
Not that it matters really, but a skiff would have handled completely different in that situation. They are pretty light and tend to bounce from wave to wave. You can stick the bow on a skiff for sure, but it's more of an abrupt thing, not slow like this situation. The cockpits are small on flats boats to give more raised deck area for fishing, not so much to keep the water out, though I guess that could be a side benefit. Some skiffs are self bailing some, usually the technical poling boats like Hell's Bay, are not. You can easily swamp a skiff if you fill the cockpit with water, I've almost done it twice, but it happens in a different way. Hard to explain but easy to see,
Odd that this boat is handling like that. Looks heavy to me. That is a HUGE fish box that washes out of the boat when it sinks, it looked empty to me but maybe not?
Last edited:
I was in a 17 foot Whaler of a friend where we submarined it coming down a wave (not too different from that video). I thought we were done for, but it shook it off with water running out the tramsom like crazy as the bow came back up. I would love to have had a picture of our faces when we looked at each other after it happened.
Last edited:
OP
OP
menzies
Guru
No sign in required on this one.
twistedtree
Guru
I think you are probably right. I'll bet he took a smaller wave earlier and got a big, but non-fatal slug of water in the boat. then as the bow went down on the final wave, all that water sloshed forward, and down she went.
The big difference with a Whaler is all the inherent buoyancy. The boat in the video sank like a rock where the whaler would just swamp and at least have a chance to keep going.
ragin cajun
Senior Member
Have to agree! There has to be a lot of water in his bilge. CCs don't run that low in the water. Even at the speed he was running that bow should have been riding higher than it was.
Dougcole
Guru
Very true.
I was a salt water fly fishing guide for 12 years, so I've got a lot of hours at the wheel of inshore boats, specifically flats skiffs. Something just seems off the boat in the video is too sluggish.
I would not want to be in that inlet in those conditions in my skiff, but the one advantage a skiff has in that situation is that it responds very quickly to throttle changes. You can "drive the boat" going slowly when needed then popping if from one wave to the next with a quick burst of throttle, tabs up and motor slight trimmed up, which would raise the bow even if only for a key second. The increased maneuverability also allows you to pick the best line through the inlet, sort of like a surfer. Heck, they run in 6 inches of water, sometimes it's even possible, depending on location, to run the super shallow edges of the inlet and miss the big breaking waves altogether. I've done that on the Gulf coast passes, though I doubt it would work in Jupiter inlet.
If the boat was overweighted and sluggish it would negate those advantages, making it just a trawler with low sides and an open cockpit.
If the video is legitimate, then the boat had serious problems before it ever hit that wave. Not just a little water, but a lot of water, sitting very low, already sinking. I've never seen a center console running as it was. The bow was running very low in the water before it even hit the final wave. Otherwise it never would have dived as it did and a little dive wouldn't have sunk it. It looked like a stunt but would have been a very expensive one. Just need the rest of the story.
Similar threads
