Not many people know about this but I think its important to talk about. Hopefully doing so will prevent this from happening again.

On Mother's day out on Lake Palestine there was a boat wreck involving 2 bass boats. While one boat was graphing on the lake another boat ran over the top of them from the back passenger corner through the passenger console and across the deck of the boat. Thankfully the anglers graphing where sitting in the driver and middle seat at the time of the incident. The driver did not have any injuries, but the young man in the middle seat was sent to the ER via ambulance.
It is unclear how this happened and pending investigations are ongoing. It was raining at the time but also 100% daylight as this happened around 10:30 am. Apparently the driver of the boat did not see the other boat. One can only assume that the driver was either driving by watching his graph while protecting his face from the rain, or well I don't have a good explanation for anything else.

The reason for this post is to bring some light to this topic. There is a young man that almost lost his life and I believe it's important to talk about to hopefully avoid something like this. It's not like it was a ski boat not paying attention it was one of our own driving and not paying attention. It can happen to anyone at anytime. Lets work to not let this happen again.

It was a HS Angler in the boat that was ran over. It was not a HS angler in the boat that ran over them.

There is a thread regarding this incident

I hope everyone stays safe out there

WOW, I did not know he almost lost his life.

Is he still in the hospital?

ok I will look for it. I did not see it. Thanks

You bet. Glad the passenger was able to get out of the way, that had to have been terrifying.

No He got out that evening thankfully, 10" to the right and it would be a different story.

I never had a graph with GPS and map tracking until I got my current boat. I catch myself watching the GPS for safety reasons making sure I'm running where I had been to avoid stumps or to get me back to the landing I came from. Even though it is a safety feature it is also a distraction so you really have to focus on looking ahead if you do this as well.

How bout slowing down some and give other boats a wide berth.

I will say it again. the only way stuff like this gets under control is when a boat hits another boat like this, drives a boat up an island, ends up in a mulch pile, drives into a dam. the driver of said boat should catch a ban for a year or 2 from every tournament organization. Short of that you are not gonna get their attention until they are involved in one themselves.

We gripe about wake boats alot, and it's almost always justified. However, it's pretty apparent to me that bass fishermen as a group are the most dangerous group of people on the water. So many boat accidents lately. Lots of bass fishermen driving crazy fast boats that apparently have no idea how to safely operate them. I never go out anymore that I don't see some idiot in a bass boat doing something stupid.

This is just about every point on the south end of Palestine, bass boats would rather save time by cutting close to the points instead of going wide around them. The Lake is wide down there, no excuses! Few weeks back this was almost me, but instead I was fishing on the front deck of a 21' Skeeter, can't believe I was that hard to see? A younger me would have handled it differently on the water.

It’s not just bass boats, it’s also inexperienced drivers. Wreck down at Choke last summer from a boat running up on another boat, one was chopped up by the propeller. It was the guilty parties first time out, they said they’d never own a boat again. “Growing the sport” has consequences.

Heres what is going to happen and its going to be sooner than later. The gov will be regulating speeds, hp, licenses, more fees, etc. Obviously the bass fishing community isnt regulating themselves very well, yet we will complain to the fullest extent when the gov has to step in.

The amount of people hurt on boats is a fraction of people hurt in cars/trucks on the highway but the boats are getting too fast, folks are distracted driving while watching graphs, and there is little training on driving a vehicle that goes 70+ miles an hour with no brakes. This applies to jet fleas, bass boats and wake boats. Every week we read about more and more bass boat wrecks but we are on a fishing forum and everyone talks about them so we see or hear about 90% of them.

I agree, it will get to a point where the government will step in and I am sure most won't like it.

The wake boats are partying, sometimes alcohol involved etc. I'm assuming that most people in the bass boats are sober, not blaring music, not watching skier behind them and still can't act right. We are way too forgiving of this stuff. It's a bunch of testosterone fueled, speed junkie nonsense going on. We are quick to look for excuses like mechanical failure etc. What it it is a bunch of morons running around in bass boats who have decided they are invincible.