The Coast Guard has some good news for us. Boating got a little bit safer last year.
The Coast Guard has issued its annual report on boating safety. The major findings:
In 2021, there were 658 fatalities, down 14 percent from the previous year (when there were many new boaters because of the pandemic).
There were 5,265 total accidents, down 16 percent.
The only bad news was that property damage hit $67.5 million, an all-time high, perhaps due to inflation or the higher price of both new and used boats.
The top five contributing factors to accidents were operator inattention, operator inexperience, improper lookout, machinery failure, and excessive speed. Alcohol was still the leading factor in fatal accidents, accounting for 86 deaths.
Capt. Troy Glendye, chief of the Coast Guard’s Office of Boating Safety, said that most accidents occurred in good weather with calm water, no or light wind, and good visibility.
For cause of death, 81 per cent of fatal boating accident victims drowned, and 83 per cent of them were not wearing a life jacket.
And 75 percent of the deaths occurred on boats where the operator had not received boating safety instruction.
Last year, the fatality rate was 5.5 percent per 100,000 registered vessels, a 15 percent decrease from the previous year, and an enormous drop from 1971, when the Safe Boating Act was first passed. At that time, the fatality rate was 20.6 per 100,000 registered vessels.
Chris Edmonston, president of the BoatUS Foundation for Boating Safety and Clean Water, said we need to focus on boating safety education. He said he was not sure if last year’s numbers were “an anomaly or a trend, but we believe the increasing number of states requiring mandatory boating safety education, as well as states requiring education for a greater portion of their boating citizens, is having a positive effect.”
Edmonston pointed out that there are no education requirements for paddle-craft operators, while 15 percent of last year’s deaths were attributed to kayaks, the same as the previous year. Read more:
https://coastguardnews.com/coast-guard-releases-2021-recreational-boating-statistics/
https://www.boatus.com/news-room/release/boating-accidents-down-in-2021-but-safety-edu
