Funniest boating mishap

[Firefly]

Following on from the stories in the Salcombe thread, what's the funniest boating mishap you've seen or been involved in? Of course, we all know, ribsters don't have mishaps....

[Noble95]

Funny, this is debatable - but driving down to Salcombe funny enough with my dad & having one of our trailer wheels over take us on the hard shoulder didn't cause slight amusement!

[Firefly]

Must be something about Salcombe...

[John Kennett]

My most spectacular boating cock up was in Salcombe too!

[gareth9702]

And in Salcombe, too. My daughter deciding the best way to pick up a visitor buoy from a yacht was not to reach down but to climb off the boat onto the buoy. Somehow she managed to stay upright.

[Nos4r2]

A full on 30 knot stuff, in front of quite a few ribnetters outside Yarmouth in my SR4. I still have the Ribnet Whale trophy.

I was aboard another (ex) ribnetter's boat fishing one day when he forgot to pull the anchor up off Alum Bay and motored off at tickover towing a mackerel line. It's quite surprising how fast an RC585 will turn 180 degrees...

[Firefly]

At Torquay Marina, I once witnessed the proud new owner of a 40ft Fairline turn up, overnight bags and family in tow, eager to take his new toy out on her maiden voyage.
Almost all available marina staff were assigned to a line, whilst the new skipper prepared for departure. With everything and everyone safely on board, the engines were duly fired up. The excitement was tangible as they prepared to slip. Then, for reasons that soon became apparent, the owner began testing the bow thrusters with amateurish enthusiasm, totally oblivious to the effect it was having on the poor chap holding the bow line.
Content with the performance of the bow thrusters, he brought in the lines and throttled forward into the fairway, straight towards the sterns of boats moored ahead. His intention, indeed his only option, was to turn to port 90 degrees, into the fairway. However, his predicament was threefold; he was going too fast, running tight alongside the pontoon on his starboard and he was harbouring a total misconception of the principal of bow thrusters.
It is worth noting that at no stage, since the initial application of power, were the throttles or steering touched. Instead, the unsuspecting owner stood by the helm with one hand on the thruster control. With the stern of the boat ahead looming, he gave the bow thruster full wellie to port. To his horror and unsurprisingly, nothing happened. Well, when I say nothing, I mean nothing happened to the current speed and course. The skipper went into immediate meltdown and made his next big blunder. Still ignoring the throttles, he swung the steering full to port. Two things happened in a very short space in time. The starboard corner of his gleaming teak covered bathing platform was forced to confront the edge of the pontoon and then the stanchion itself. The platform lost; perhaps, more accurately, he lost the starboard corner of his platform. By now he had somehow managed to point the boat in the direction he so desperately needed. Then came the painful demonstration of linear momentum in practise. Although he was pointing the right way, he continued to travel broadside on the original course, straight into the back of 3 moored cruisers. Metal bent, fibreglass crunched, wood snapped and a tender popped like a balloon.
What experience has he got, I asked the harbour master, as soon as I could speak. None, he replied, it’s his first boat. Somehow, you can always spot a novice!!!

[The Black Pig]

At Dittisham I witnessed a long suffering wife and her husband coming along side a pontoon in their dingy with the wife perched on the bow with a rope ready to tie up, the skipper slapped the outboard in reverse with too much throttle only for the wife to do a slow motion forward role shoulder first into the drink

Sometimes it's hard not to laugh at other peoples misfortunes

I was poised at the ready to do my duty if nessasary but all was well

[JamesF]

We'd had some engine trouble with the Mercury 25 on one of our Seariders. Starting, water circulation problems, gummed up carbs that had to be put through ultrasonic cleaning. It had been out of action for a couple of months all told.

I was the first out in it afterwards, to cover junior sailing training. Me, one instructor, one trainee on board.

About 400 yards off the beach, the engine slowed down when I opened the throttle. Then sped up when I closed it. And then stopped. All the previous trouble with it was probably the reason why the first thing I did was say "Rescue 3, Rescue 1. This engine's stopped again, over." rather than try to work out why.

So out came the other boat to investigate, and what was wrong?

The instructor standing on the fuel line.


And of course, I've also spent more minutes than I'd like to admit tied up alongside committee boats full of race officers, with other safety boats around, trying to start the engine with the kill cord unplugged.

[jyasaki]

Posted this before, but I'll write it up again (seems easier than looking up the prior post):

Out to watch fireworks on New Years Eve, me and my buddy both launched out of Alameda on the Estuary. Ran out to about Pier 39 to watch the lights, and headed back after the show; maybe 12:20am or so? Dodging unlit dinghies, sailboats, and whatever else was out, we got back to the ramp at about 1am. My buddy Jeff tied up and went up to get his truck, staged in line (there were maybe 6 boats ahead of us) and when it was his turn, backed the trailer into the water. He had Pam take the wheel, and returned to his RIB, power loading it onto the trailer. At this time, everyone was watching him, as the normal method was to manhandle the boat into position, attach the strap to the bow eye, and off you go. So, with the boat in position, I hear Jeff yell "Okay, Pam, Nice and easy". He kept a bit of throttle on to hold the boat until the bunks grabbed, and waited for the trailer to start moving. There was slight chirp of the tires, and Pam took off up the ramp, expertly maneuvering the rig to miss the K-barriers and other trailers, ending up nicely centered in the parking space. Meanwhile, nobody on the dock said a word. Jeff was sitting in the water, his boat still in place after the trailer was snatched from underneath, much like the tablecloth from under the place settings magicians trick. After about 30 seconds, some random guy on the dock says "Is she coming back?" And everyone started laughing. Except Jeff.

Jeff's son ran up and, as Pam was getting out of the truck, asked "Pam, forget something?" She looked back, and just said "Shit." She refused to come back down to the ramp, until Jeff's kid finally convinced her to.

The guy between Jeff and me had his wife pull the truck out, to which Pam said "Sure she can do it..."

The guy looked at her and said "After seeing you, I made sure to tie the boat down before she moved."

I still get to rib Pam about that every chance I get (which includes calling her out of the blue to "reminisce".

jky

Edit: I think I should have looked up the old post.

[Peter_C]

My first trip out on a RIB, the boat owner disconnected the boat tie downs, and prepped the boat to launch. Apparently he was not worried about the roller bunks, even though I said something out of concern. So he jumps in the van and puts it in reverse. With a tiny jerk of the trailer, the boat slides right down, lands hard on the concrete boat ramp, on the bottom end of the transom, and continues self launching into the water to where it is now floating. Ironically this was a highly experienced boater having grown up racing sailboats. We never spoke of it again.

[John Kennett]

At least it made it as far as the water. I know of a geezer who did the same thing but ended up with a big RIB high and dry at the top of the ramp!

[Trimix]

On my second trip out in my new boat I joined in the fun on the 2014 Nacho run as a complete novice.

At the end of a great day I pulled the boat out of the water onto my bunk trailer and set off out of the carpark all happy and smug. Only to realise it was not quite sitting square on the trailer.

So, no problem, I will just reverse back down the slip, float the rear of the boat and straighten it all up.

What I forgot to do was refit the bungs !

So as the rear entered the water it started to fill up - not that I noticed.

After much faffing about lining it all up neat and square on the trailer I then saw the problem sloshing around my feet !

There must have been half the Solent in the boat by now, the whole rear compartment under the seats was full to the brim - I jumped overboard up to my chest to try to refit the bungs (which were in my pocket) while my mate switched on the bilge pumps.

Much to the amusement of the rest of the Ribnet Nacho crowd

[BogMonster]

It's nothing exceptional as an event, but my first and biggest proper stuff in the Osprey was probably what made me laugh most in my nine years on the water. Bombing along at probably 20-25 knots on a sunny but fairly lumpy day, slightly faster than was sensible in a fair bit of swell and thoroughly enjoying myself, I suddenly and briefly found that Neptune had invented a hole in the water and I was now in fact piloting something flying rather than floating and then boomf! I didn't even have time to think "oh sh***" and I remember to this day about 1 second of thinking "Ooo that's pretty, I wish I'd brought a camera" as the world took on a wonderfully fluorescent green tinge, the sun twinkled through the ascending curtain of water - and then about half the South Atlantic landed on top of me. It was one of those moments where everything happens in slow motion.

I guess it must have been a combination of the ridiculous thought process (regret at not having a camera ready), relief at the fact that I managed not to eat the chartplotter (I don't know how, as I did 20-0 in about 1 second) and being drowned in extremely cold South Atlantic, but I just sat there laughing insanely for several minutes before I actually got around to emptying the boat out and carrying on.

[Nos4r2]

Originally Posted by BogMonster

It's nothing exceptional as an event, but my first and biggest proper stuff in the Osprey was probably what made me laugh most in my nine years on the water. Bombing along at probably 20-25 knots on a sunny but fairly lumpy day, slightly faster than was sensible in a fair bit of swell and thoroughly enjoying myself, I suddenly and briefly found that Neptune had invented a hole in the water and I was now in fact piloting something flying rather than floating and then boomf! I didn't even have time to think "oh sh***" and I remember to this day about 1 second of thinking "Ooo that's pretty, I wish I'd brought a camera" as the world took on a wonderfully fluorescent green tinge, the sun twinkled through the ascending curtain of water - and then about half the South Atlantic landed on top of me. It was one of those moments where everything happens in slow motion.

I guess it must have been a combination of the ridiculous thought process (regret at not having a camera ready), relief at the fact that I managed not to eat the chartplotter (I don't know how, as I did 20-0 in about 1 second) and being drowned in extremely cold South Atlantic, but I just sat there laughing insanely for several minutes before I actually got around to emptying the boat out and carrying on.

Sounds so familiar. When I stuffed the SR4, I had Ballastboy aboard and I knew it was going to happen just before it did so I shouted 'Duck!' and ducked. He shouted 'Whaaaat?' just as it hit him in the face.

It went into his mouth so hard that it was coming out of his nose.

[Hightower]

After a nice RIBnet cruise around the Solent a few years ago a few of us went back to my local slip "Haslar" for recovery. Someone with a small cruiser had beaten us to the slip which wasn't unusual but what followed was interesting.

Quite clearly he had no idea on how to recover and as his trailer probably wasn't best set-up didn't help. We disembarked to the pontoon it was clear he was already puffing and panting and starting to get irate with his predicament. He was barking orders at his poor kids and starting to swearing a lot. We all stood looking at each other on the pontoon wondering who was going to get their head bitten off by offering some helpful advice lol.

In the end with a falling tide we managed to sqeeze down the outside of him and recover one by one.

[Razorbill RIBs]

We blocked the grille on the Jet once just as we headed out. Weedrake wouldn't clear (unusual) so we limped back in and unloaded. Stripped to pants (not pretty) and swam under to see what the problem was, found a wreath someone must have thrown to sea for a loved one stuck fast to the intake with florists wire wrapped around the grille.... was diving under pulling out roses and wire, surfacing for breath and swearing a lot.... only to then notice that the BBC had a drone up filming on the quay....still dreading seeing that on tv sometime...

[solent spence]

A few years ago we were launching our Ring 18 in Swanwick and had to wait ages for 2 teenage lads to clear the slip with their wreck of a recently purchased very old 15ft speed boat. They had bought it off ebay, had no experience, and said the seller told them all they needed was a mobile phone to use it! We mentioned that the weather was deteriorating and they should take care. Off they went oblivious.

We knew it was going to blow up that day, and so had appropriate clothing, safety kit etc. Once we got out of the Hamble it was horrid, so after about 40 minutes of high adrenaline wave jumping (it was a great boat) we called it a day and headed back to the slip.

We found those two lads still in their shorts, soaked, freezing cold, with a badly damaged speed boat (screen had gone and inside was flooded quite deep) trying to start their work's transit van to haul it out. But all their kit had been submerged - mobiles didn't work, van key immobiliser wet so engine wouldn't start etc.

We towed their trailer out for them and thought how lucky they were.

[HughN]

^^^^ Young lads.

I sold a trailer on eBay and arranged collection for an evening later that week. Two young lads turned up to collect it - on pushbikes. After a lot of head-scratching they put their bike lights on the back, chucked their bikes on the trailer bunks and 'scootered' it down the road.

[whisper]

I heard that someone went into a sunseeker at the boat show a few years ago and did a poo in one of the loos