Sobering Truth about Boating and Drinking

Some sobering facts:

• Nearly 1,000 people die in boating accidents every year.
  
  
• 90% of them drown. Drowning is the third leading cause of accidental death in the United States.
  
  
• More than 50% of all boating fatalities involve alcohol.
  
  

The U.S. Coast Guard estimates the number of non-fatal boating accidents to be 60,000 or higher with property damage well over $240 million annually

Each year, boating accidents claim 1,000 lives and injure thousands more. Waterways are second only to highways as the scene of accidental deaths in this country. The Coast Guard and the U.S. Congress recognize alcohol as a significant problem on the water.

Boat Stressors

Stressors commonly affecting helmsmen make drinking while operating a boat even more dangerous than drinking and driving.
Research shows that four hours' exposure to noise, vibration, sun, glare, wind and other motion on the water produces a kind of "boater's hypnosis" or fatigue, which slows reaction time almost as much as if you were legally drunk. Adding alcohol to boating stress factors intensifies their effects - each drink multiplies your accident risk.

Boating is more fun than driving, right? No speed limits, no traffic signals, no merging lanes and no potholes. If you think that makes operating a boat under the influence of alcohol safer than drinking and driving, you could be dead wrong. Alcohol affects your ability to function in three critical ways. Your

• Balance
• Judgment and
• Reaction Time

A few beers under your belt can put you under...

Alcohol's effect on your balance can be critical on a boat; simply falling overboard and drowning accounts for at least one in four boating fatalities. When you are "tipsy", the unstable, moving platform of the boat can easily cause you to fall overboard. The alcohol that made you lose your balance also reduces your body's ability to protect you against the cold water. With alcohol in your blood, the numbing effects of cold water occur much faster than when you are sober. Within minutes, you may not be able to call for help, swim to a float, or reach the safety of the boat.

Alcohol also intensifies the effect of caloric labyrinthitis; a fancy term for the disorientation caused by water entering the ear. A drunk person whose head is immersed can become so confused that he swims down to death instead of up to safety. This explains why some good swimmers who have been drinking suddenly drown with no apparent reason.

Alcohol can make a bad situation worse...

What else do you lose when you drink? Your judgment. In skills tests, alcohol-impaired boat operators all reported that they were better operators while intoxicated than sober, despite instrument readings that documented their reduced performance. Alcohol reduces inhibitions, causing normally cautious people to try stunts or enter high-risk situations that a sober person would avoid.

Alcohol only makes you think you are performing better...

... and dramatically reduces your reaction time

Alcohol severly diminishes your ability to react to several different signals at once. With the first drink, brain functions are depressed. It takes longer to receive information from your eyes, ears and other sense, and still more time to react. When peripheral vision, focus and depth perception are impaired by alcohol, it is difficult to correctly judge speed and distance, or track moving objects. Reduced night vision and the inability to distinguish red from green make the intoxicated night boater an even greater hazard.

Sobering Truth about Boating and Drinking