Big wave throws dive boat captain overboard - Florida

[Joneill]

He could be vigorously turning the wheel even if he lost power. The rudder would still be able to do something, just maybe not enough.

Would love to hear the explanation as to how the boat got broadside to the waves as it's not really possible to ascertain from the videos. They do seem under power to some extent on the first wave but did not hit it head on so it turned them. After that they did not seem to react to turn back to port to meet the next one that almost rolled them?

 

[scubadada]

Just wow.

I've taken several boats (passenger) in and out of BB Inlet... its super shallow, and very narrow and can get insane. But this... woah. Being on a dive boat suddenly with no Captain at the controls.... that is scary stuff.

FWIW - I did a shore dive Saturday... it was dead flat calm in Lauderdale...

Scary.

It was gorgeous in Boynton Beach on Saturday also, what a difference a day makes

 

[SoFlaDiver954]

Conditions were supposed to be not great but diveable early in the day, with seas building to 6-8ft later in the day.

High tide was between 11 and noon and the swell was making for some big waves in the inlets. Once you got out of the inlet and channel, there was ~2ft chop when I was out between 8am and noon.

 

[The Chairman]

That's the third boat incident in that inlet. The Loggerhead was flipped a few years back and a captain on a fishing charter was tossed and killed by a wave a year earlier.

What caused him to turn sideways? The raw power of nature is the answer. I've dove off that boat and with that captain. Both are great and I wouldn't hesitate to go with either, or both together. It seems like every other year, this inlet claims a boat: boynton beach inlet boat capsized - Google Search

 

[MaxBottomtime]

This video posted yesterday elsewhere appears to show the vessel lost power? Or steering or nobody was driving it?

 

[Johnoly]

They are lucky the boat didn't capsize,...

They were still NOT bouncing the props off the sand because they were deep enough. That boat won't turtle roll even in twice that surf height because so much weight is so low, UNLESS it catches the prop on the sand, then it's game over. That's what happened to the prior roll overs. There's a green boat in Jupiter that has a steel roll cage that many of us have been on in wicked surf. Never was worried about a roll over, just about the rocks.

P.S tip,,,look closely at the tanks and almost all have a BC (hopefully inflated) attached. Most all divers pack their gear before the inlet traverse. Some smart DM made a great call telling divers to leave their gear setup. Personally I like to stand on the transom holding my mask and fins so I can jump clear of the props if we are going surfing shallow and always click your bag handle around the bench leg to get your gear back.

 

[Joneill]

That's the third boat incident in that inlet. The Loggerhead was flipped a few years back and a captain on a fishing charter was tossed and killed by a wave a year earlier.

What caused him to turn sideways? The raw power of nature is the answer. I've dove off that boat and with that captain. Both are great and I wouldn't hesitate to go with either, or both together. It seems like every other year, this inlet claims a boat: boynton beach inlet boat capsized - Google Search

Actually, not approaching the first wave correctly and with sufficient power appears to be what initially turned this boat sideways - I'm curious as to why they did that and why they did not seem to try to correct before the next wave hit them broadside - not blaming: as a previous boat owner for almost 20 years, I'm just trying to understand what happened in this case?

 

[Bob DBF]

Would love to hear the explanation as to how the boat got broadside to the waves as it's not really possible to ascertain from the videos.

As @The Chairman alluded, sometimes the wave broadsides you, despite your best efforts. Waves change size, refract, reflect, and reinforce, around an inlet it can get to be a mess. Have a bunch of waves reinforce each other unexpectedly at just the wrong place, it can push a boat into a position the skipper has been trying to avoid.

Piloting a vessel is as much an art as it is a science.


Glad it worked out ok

Bob

 

[Rollin Bonz]

This video posted yesterday elsewhere appears to show the vessel lost power? Or steering or nobody was driving it?

Crazy stuff. Glad everyone is OK.

Slight derail, but what is the thing at 1:50 that seems to be spewing something into the water?

 

[PBcatfish]

I’ve been though that inlet more than a few times. I avoid it whenever possible. It’s one of the toughest inlets around. More than one experienced local commercial captain has gone down in that spot. Conditions there often build quickly, especially as mid-tide approaches.

Getting in there successfully, often involves timing your entry with the waves. Often there will be a discernible pattern to the waves & picking the right spot to enter a trough before a small wave can be the key to success. It’s not the easiest thing to do, but unfortunately, it is often necessary there & many of the local captains have gotten good at it.

The alternative is to go north about 12 miles to Lake Worth Inlet, which is a nice wide, 40’ minimum-depth shipping-channel. It gets a little rolly polly at the mouth of that inlet, but nothing like you see at Boynton. If he had gone north to LWI, he would then have had to go probably another 12 or so more miles down the ICW, mostly in speed controlled zones. Now that manatee season is back, even more areas of the ICW are under speed control than normal. That round trip would have added hours to his voyage.

20-20 hindsight indicates that going north to LWI would have been his better move that day. I’m sure that there will be no shortage of keyboard commandos to make that point fully clear. I suspect that pretty close to none of those commandos will have ever driven a boat through that inlet & therefore will not be commenting from a position of local knowledge & experience, which is unfortunate for the reputation of the captain who had a bad day.

Fortunately, the locals understand what that inlet is like & several of them sprang into action when duty called. The outcome was embarrassment & cause for retrospect on the part of the unfortunate captain. It could have been a lot worse. Thank god for the good hearty locals. Some of the guys in Boynton are a pretty tight bunch.