Navigation Lights / Be safe out there

This weekend, my wife and I were heading out for a night cruise in our Nautique at around 9:00 pm; it was a clear night but well after sunset, and it was quite dark. Exiting a river into the main open area of our lake, I saw a very faint darker spot in the water ahead of me, just barely different enough to catch my eye. I stood up above my windshield and squinted, looking ahead about 75 feet and sure enough, its A BOAT with no bow visible lights, coming toward us.

It was about a 14' aluminum boat (by my best guess) with a small outboard, and it had two people in it. I stopped my boat and said "Hey you have no bow light!!" Not aggressively, but loud enough so I was sure to be heard, and I'm sure there was a degree of surprise in my voice. As they got closer, I could see a teeny stern light, but it was a foot too low to be seen over the people in the boat. His quick response was, "under 12 feet I don't need a bow light, but thanks for blocking the channel" (I had stopped my boat so I could figure out what was going on).

NH law requires any "power-driven vessel underway" (and under 65 feet) to display red/green bowlights, and a white light visible from 360 degrees. I said to the guy, "Length has nothing to do with it, You have a motor, you need a bow light. Sailboats even need a bowlight if they are under way. More importantly, I could not see you until I was extremely close." He replied, "Nope, I don't need a bow light under 12 feet, look it up." Of course I said, "I highly recommend you ask marine patrol or look it up yourself. You're gonna cause an accident driving around like that. I couldn't see you at all." I also know what a 12' boat looks like and 12 feet is pretty small. This boat was more than 12 feet, but that's really beside the point.

I was thinking, if we had been 2 minutes earlier, I would have been on plane on the main lake as he was coming in to the river, and could EASILY have hit him at 20mph, which would have been catastrophic. I use the lake at night a lot, I always display proper lights, and stuff like this scares the hell out of me, that I could drive straight into an unmarked boat because of someone else's ignorance. I didn't swear at the guy but I was not happy with him, and his clear misunderstanding of the law, and more importantly, common sense!

In hindsight, I wish I had gotten the bow numbers, but I didn't expect this person to argue with me! Lots of people go out and find themselves out later than they expected, without proper lights. But they would have responded differently. I've had similar conversations before and they usually result in, "Woah, I'm sorry, I didn't realize..." This guy was out there after dark, invisible to other boats except from right behind. When he argued with me, I definitely got more confrontational because of the risks at play here.

Was I out of line here? Thoughts?

8122pbrainard wrote: Morgan, You were not out of line at all. Too bad you didn't get the registration number. He should have been reported before something serious happens.

Thanks, yeah that's where I was coming from. At first I thought, he just doesn't know. Then when he argued, I was so surprised I didn't even think at first to grab my flashlight and see if I could get the numbers - it was way too dark to see them without a flashlight.

I also dim my dash lights totally to "off" and put something over the perfect pass gauge so I can see better. Imagine anyone with a lit up dash, no way they'd see this guy even at the range where I spotted the faint silhouette.

seacamper wrote: I think I would have just thrown my anchor through the bottom of his puny boat.

Haha, well I didn't have time to even ready the torpedoes...

I saw a very similar boat the next day, again with only a stern light, but it had a different outboard on it. I wondered if some place is renting these things, and giving out bad information (wouldn't be the first time). Until I saw the different engine, I was memorizing the bow numbers and thinking about what to say. I used to have the personal cell phone of our marine patrol guy, but he retired unfortunately.

seacamper wrote: I think I would have just thrown my anchor through the bottom of his puny boat.

Yeah but then he might have scratched your anchor!

I was launching my boat two or three weeks ago on a Saturday afternoon about 4:00 PM to get some skiing in and a NC Wildlife Officer walked up to me at the ramp and asked me if he could perform a safety check of my boat. If he found a issue on dry land NO ticket would be given. We did the quick inspection, Life Jackets, Fire Ext., Throw Cushion and Spark Arrestor. Then he gave me a sticker to place on my windshield so I would not get stopped on the water just for a safety check.

The interesting thing about it was he gave me his business card with his phone number and told me to call him day or night if I saw anyone on the lake at night running with no lights. He said he did not care if it was 3 or 4 AM but he wanted me to call him. I explained that at dusk, we will already be back on the trailer.   

Donald

stepper459 wrote: This actually isn't the first - or even the worst - close call I've had at night. Years ago we were going about 20-25mph - the night speed limit is 20 - and went between an island and a point of mainland, maybe 500 feet between the two and we went right up the middle. I was sitting in the observer's seat of my friend's American Skier at the time, and I said, "Holy **** did you see that?!" The driver says, "see what?" and looks behind us. In the glow of the stern light someone is furiously paddling a canoe. How close did we come? No idea. This was an obvious travel route on the lake, but fairly narrow, and yet this guy was sitting in the middle apparently. We had been coming from about a mile away, with our lights on of course, so totally visible the whole way. It's not like we came around a corner out of nowhere. Also ski boats aren't exactly stealthy in terms of noise. Yikes.

Bad things come in threes, might be a good idea to slow down at night. You chop a canoe in half at 25 mph in the dark it's not going to matter if he had lights on or not, it's a bad situation to put yourself in.

We're on a big lake and I prefer to stay off it after dark. As beautiful as it is out there, I think it's just too dangerous. Here's a story that happened the evening of our first CCF reunion in 2007.

http://www.mrlakefront.net/news/2008/09/24/lapointe-long-lake-boat-crash-was-tragic-accident-/

skutsch wrote: We used to run all the time late at night on the Mississippi River, but only if we had a beam spot light, amazing what you can see using one of these... I would think you would want the same if you were running on a lake. BTW, even in a canoe, I would want some sort of visible light for my own safety

You are required to have a white light, visible 360 degrees, in any vessel not tied to a dock or mooring immediately adjacent to shore. So, it's only people not realizing how dangerous it is, who are out there without any lights.

As far as the spotlight, the problem there is that it's actually illegal to drive with such lights on continuously, because it's absolutely blinding to other boats that may be coming your way, or even going away from you for that matter. More and more boats have docking lights these days, and it's awful trying to see what you're doing, when you're near them.

These days, we're mostly out on clear nights where visibility isn't that bad once your eyes adjust. Any night with some moonlight and suddenly you can see a lot more.

Night vision glasses would be amazing, or an IR camera like some cars have...