How does this happen

[XBIGPUN66]

https://wgntv.com/news/wisconsin/new...ed-3-children/

It seems like a dumb question, but this seems like it was avoidable for several reasons. What do people think about this?

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[NautiqueJeff]

How were these kids trapped? Strapped in? Parents put them in the storage compartments? Something doesn't make sense here.

[bturner]

Geez a P25? I heard about this over the weekend and thought it was going to be some smaller cabin boat or a pontoon. A G25 is a lot of boat and apparently whoever was driving or acting as captain at the time under estimated the conditions or over estimated his crafts capabilities. Having grown up boating on the Detroit River and the North East end of Lake Erie I've been caught in several rather nasty storms that came out of no where and seas that went from less than 6" to >4' in less than 20 minutes. When you're a mile or 2 from safe harbor I promise you you'll remember it. You can make a good inboard get through just about anything with enough patience and throttle control but if you don't have the rough seas experience and try to power through a storm like that one your outcome is absolutely not guaranteed. Your first instinct is always to make a direct run for home but sometimes quartering the waves or positioning yourself into a following sea and riding it out even if it takes longer to get to shelter is the better move. I wasn't there so I'm not going to second guess his decisions however from what I've seen on the news and read there were a bunch of boats that were much less sea worthy than a P25 out there in that storm and this was the only one that capsized.

As to the kids getting trapped..... Last story, I promise. A friend of mine decided to see the Detroit fireworks that are launched from a barge in the Detroit River in front of one of the downtown parks. He owned an 18' bow rider and took that boat to the river that night with his wife and her sister's family which included the husband and 2 kids about 7 and 9. He anchored the boat from the stern in the river which flows at about 6 MPH to get the boat best positioned for everyone to see the fireworks. You have to remember this is the Detroit River and there are a ton of 40'+ boats out there and most of them are going to be driven by people who have been drinking all day. So the fireworks go off without a hitch but as soon as they end everyone there pulls anchor and start speeding off for home. A large boat passes his anchored boat while coming on plane throwing a huge wake and since he's tied off from the stern and has the current working against him, the stern has nowhere to go but underwater. This immediately capsizes the boat with the kids wearing their life jackets trapped under the area by the front passenger seat. My friend had the sense to stay with the boat and figured out quickly where the kids were and was able to drag them from that spot to the top of the capsized hull. He was also lucky there were a several boats that saw what was happening and quickly came to render assistance. Had he not kept his composure and kept track of where those kids were, that night would have turned out much differently.

If I were to guess what happened here my guess would be that the parents placed the kids in that same area with life jackets on to shelter them from the weather. I'm also guessing that boat didn't just slowly roll over but that it came over quickly trapping the kids with life jackets on which would pin them where they were and no one was able to figure out or physically able to get to where they were to get them out in time.

Truly sad and unfortunate for everyone. My hart goes out to all of them. I can only imagine having to live with that experience always second guessing what I could or should have done.

[Scooter G]

We've had some close storm calls, and sometimes when the adrenaline starts to pump it's hard to keep your head about you. That is an extreme tragedy, out of your control, but I don't know how you would ever forgive yourself. Prayers to the Family.
Side note, never anchor from the stern in moving water.

[XBIGPUN66]

I guess what I think is this was preventable at three points during this day

1. Check the weather and perhaps don't bring elderly and little kids out on that lake when there is severe weather risk
2. Know that there is severe weather risk as captain. Monitor the weather and radar closely. Pull up and go in when you see the bad weather coming your way. Or at least stay close to the safe side of the lake.
3. You get caught out there. Either stay at the party cove and suck it up. You will get wet. Or know how to drive your boat in heavy waves and go to a safer area.

We have been caught out there on mendota before in a storm and it can get quite rough. You as captain have to know how to safely drive through it to get to safety or you just stay in the safe area and get wet




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[swatguy]

I can tell you how it happened as my daughters work the docks over there right where it went down and watched it transpire . A massive microburst tore through the area without warning , nothing on radar no time to warm. Skies just turned grey and in manner of minutes it was hurricane like conditions . Couldn’t see past your bow . Everyone started heading for the docks. so people were stuck floating in holding pattern to wait for the dock areas to clear on holiday weekend. Tragic situation. Over 20
homes were lost and over 30 boats in lifts were completely turned over with boats on them It was pandaemonium and chaos.

All kids were wearing vests, so was everyone in family. The boat took 2 huge waves over the bow and started listing, we are taking tornado winds , on a huge lake . One came slappped side , sent the boat over upside down as it was listing. Kids seemed to have been trapped between bimini the boat interior… If you’ve ever seen /watched boat go down it’s also creates vacuum and sucks you under. It happened fast. Parents and others tried swimming towards them but winds and size of waves were way too strong. Over dozen boats were shored and slamming the wall on the esteem shoreline right in front of that dock area shoreline. Lots of people abonded their boats and swam for shore. Like I said nothing was on the radar and day was supposed to be clear with 15% chance showers and whammo . no warning , just sky going immediate grey, 40 -50 mph winds and sideways rain coming down in sheets out of nowhere. My daughters and couple other workers tried to grab one of the rental toons to get that way with crew……only the first wave they took ripped the toon top deck corner right off the brace , caved in sheet metal , and they decided it was bad idea. I’ve been driving boats on big lakes for decades. The weather won that day in serious way .i could argue a bit of inexperience was small factor, but it was a giant handful and some luck for even the most experienced. There were multiple boats lost that day, but the main storyi is the stroy because of the lives lost.

[Cadesun]

We are on LG and luckily decided not to go out for a morning surf session that day. For those that don't know the lake, it is a 7 mile shot from the west to the east end so when the straight line winds which clocked at around 100 MPH that day started, they had the whole lake to pick up steam. Like others have said, there were chances for severe weather in the forecast but the tornado sirens did not blow nor did any phone alerts at the time this was occurring. Lots of boats ended up on the beach and rocks on the east end of the lake. The error likely came from not keeping the boat powered into the direction of the wind. Even a momentary slip on the throttle would have resulted in a nasty porpoise and a swamped boat.

Very somber 4th around here, it is a reminder of how quickly our favorite pastime can become dangerous.

[fsts2k]

I wondered if this would pop up here.

We were at the lake the day this happened and were on the water most of the morning. To repeat what SwatGuy said, it came in fast. I was on the dock watching the storm race down the lake, it was dark and nasty... while there had been weather predicted, nothing this intense.

The storm tracked straight down the lake building momentum over 6 miles and then hit a part of the lake called the narrows which further accelerated the waves as the lake is squeezed.. from there the waves tracked straight to Big Foot Beach (East side) where the boat that sunk and many other boats were anchored.

Big Foot is a common place for boats to anchor to spend the day at the lake. Nearly all of the boats typically anchor with their bow pointed towards the West and the stern effectivly tied up to the shore; thus the waves would have impacted the bow first. Confirming what Cadesus said, nearly all of these boats ended up in the rocks as the waves drove boats into the shore.

I suspect the waves were 4-6 feet high coming in rapid succession. Lake Geneva is known to have significant wave and chop due to the shape of the lake and the shoreline, with this storm that was amplified. A neighbor was on his 30+ foot Cobalt, he had waves crashing over the front of his bow right before he got it on the lift. There are pictures of houses and trees that were downed and damaged, it was quite a storm.

It is not hard to see how the driver of the boat that sunk may have made a small mistake, took two waves over the bow and got worried as the boat filled with water. Then they may have determined he needed to change direction to get to the shore only to get broadsided and flip fast which trapped the kids.

It was and continues to be a very sad event. Appropriatly the lake was quite quiet the rest of the weekend.

[FMSki 'n Surf]

There are some POV YT video of the storm. Hellacious. We get some wind tunnel howlers here but not in the summer. Similar to the Tahoe event, where a Chris Craft overturned.

The question I have : Does empty ballast tanks create and unstable boat when the deck is flooded? Does Nautique model or do "destructive" testing against these swamped conditions? If top deck is filled with water, subfloor ballast holds air and there is ample side force, high COG, over it goes??