While leaving Gull island on Saturday night, in the channel near the lighthouses, as we were pulling out, my son had an accident and was injured in a manner that required immediate attention. As there were no other boats around at the time, I cut the engine so that my wife and I could attend to him. After about 2 minutes adrift while getting him calm and patched up, I noticed a Scarab type boat barreling toward us. There was ample room in the channel to get by us by 60 + feet and I knew that they saw us so I didn't think about it again until a few seconds later when I looked up saw the sh*t eating grin on the drivers face as he passed literally 10-14 feet (no exaggeration) from our stern. This of course caused a bad situation to get worse as my wife attempted to aid our child while we were thrown violently around.
I often anchor at various places in the lake (mid lake, not channels) and have had several encounters with these boats coming within several yards with no other traffic in sight and have usually chalked it up to the driver pretty much showing off or just passing withthin a safe distance to rattle people up a little bit and have some fun, which is no big deal.
Aside from being an utter jackass, is there any point to blowing past a stationary vessel by 10 feet or so at 35-45 mph? Is there some lesson that this %$#@head was trying to teach me that I should know after being on the water for 10 + years? Since my son did receive additional (although very minor) injuries as a result of this @$$hole,
do I need to trade in my cruiser for one of these boats so that next time I can get a wave or thumbs up from this guy from a respectable distance instead of disrespect and disregard for anybody's safety while he's on the water?
I often anchor at various places in the lake (mid lake, not channels) and have had several encounters with these boats coming within several yards with no other traffic in sight and have usually chalked it up to the driver pretty much showing off or just passing withthin a safe distance to rattle people up a little bit and have some fun, which is no big deal.
Aside from being an utter jackass, is there any point to blowing past a stationary vessel by 10 feet or so at 35-45 mph? Is there some lesson that this %$#@head was trying to teach me that I should know after being on the water for 10 + years? Since my son did receive additional (although very minor) injuries as a result of this @$$hole,
do I need to trade in my cruiser for one of these boats so that next time I can get a wave or thumbs up from this guy from a respectable distance instead of disrespect and disregard for anybody's safety while he's on the water?