Sunk boat at the delta

who all saw the sunk boat on the delta today right outside of discovery bay? if it is someone on this forum is everyone all right and what happened? i have some pics but i don't think i'll post them

post em

I second that

What sort of boat? Was it only partially sunk?

post the pics.

If it was fully submerged you probably could not see it in the delta.

I'm dying to see a pic, or get a little more info.

I saw an empty MC trailer last night leaving Orwoods, and had an awful feeling about it. It isn't unusual to see empty trailers leaving Orwoods, but a few less on the weekends. And like I said, I had a really weird vib when it passed me.

ok i'll post them but i dunno how clear they are all you can see is the bow up because they were inflating it to bring it to the top and it flipped i suppose but it was just tower and box outta the water with vessel assist standing gaurd when we first saw it. it was definetly all the way under. my guess just by the tower was probally a sanger or supreme because it had a proflight on it. pics are on the way

(Message edited by wakeeater on July 23, 2006)

heres the pics in the first you can see the tower and box and the second picture was as we got to the other side of the vessel ssit boat the guy is then sitting on the bow

I can't see a damn thing

well all but the tower in the first pic and the nose where he's sitting in the second pic are under water

Forgeting to put your put your bilge drain plug in sucks

I was there too.

j rod do u by chance kno who this happened?

BTW, is the Vessel Assist thing a tax payer benefit or does the owner have to pay for the service?

Was the guy s WW'er?

I don't think becomes a taxpayer issue 'till it obstructs a water way, or is leaking fuel, oil, or sewage.

http://www.vesselassist.com/

Actually the the drain plug was in! We were the second boat on scene and one of only a few who offered assistance and the only one who stuck around to help the boat owner out!

The boat a 2006 Sanger 215, the boat owner out of respect will remain unnamed, I to have pictures that I will not post also out of respect to the boat owner. The boat was not over loaded or weighted down. All 6 passengers were able to get out of the boat unharmed and were able to swim to shore.

The boat was over taken by first a yatch wave (the yatch dispite what might come about is NOT at fault). The driver took one wave over the bow, began to bildge out and make progress when he took on another three waves, consecutively (all produced from boats passing to close). He began to bail out by hand and also by using his Fat Sac pump, but was unable to keep up when a fourth over took the boat and she sank within 30 seconds. Again all on board were able to swim ashore safely.

Sheriff was called and after 45 minutes and no response Sheriff was again called. An hour after the incident a smaller Vessel Assist arrived and fifteen minutes later the Sheriff arrived. The Sheriff provided little to no help and did not stay on scene after. They did manage to slow traffic for a short amount of time and they were able to hand out a few tickets for gun wall riding, but offered little to no assist otherwise.

We offered to help the boat owner and his passengers by collecting all their belongings and taking them to back to Orwood. I stayed with the boat owner and helped him try to slow traffic while this larger Vessel Assist was on it's way.

It was amazing how many people didn't offer assistance or didn't slow down dispite the desperate waving of flags and loud whistling. This still was an issue once Vessel Assist arrived. To all of you who slowed we really can't thank you enough!

An air bag technique was used to lift the boat, however because of approaching and passing wakes Vessel Assist struggled and getting the boat lifted and unfortunately she rolled onto her belly. Thankfully by 7pm Vessel Assist had the boat back at the dock and partially pumped out. The charge at the end of the day from Vessel Assist $3500 payable at the time of service!

The hull of the boat suffered minor damage from where she lay on her side on the sandy bottom and was bounced due to passing boat wakes. I've not yet heard back from the boat owner at this time, but I'm sure the boat will be deamed a total loss!

If I could offer any advice to any one who frequents the Delta ... please slow and offer assistance to boats in distress. Please follow etiqutte and safety precautions.

Yesterday was willingly helping a submerged Sanger while today we witnesses another Sanger run a ground in Middle River on the sandbar just outside Union Point. Please be aware of these changing and shifting sandbars. Some one has taken the liberty to place bouys on this sandbar, however this is about the 10th boat I've seen beached in 2 weeks!

Just Be Careful


(Message edited by jetgofish on July 23, 2006)

That's too bad. Glad everyone got off safely though.
Today at Berryessa we towed someone for 30 minutes that broke down. I was amazed how many people went by us within 25 feet and at 30mph+.

teri if you know the person would he like me to remove the pictures if so i will. i was truely surprised on how fast they got that boat outta there, not to mention how many idiots we yelled at when idling by to slow down. we literally told one guy its 5 mph theres a sunk boat and then they decided to speed back up and continue tubing. teri were you in the green mastercraft if so great job doing what you guys could out there and we did our best to help both times we passed but too many people just don't get it or listen. my friends told me about the sanger run aground. they offered help but they were just going to wait for the tide. the tullies need to grow again on the sandbar

(Message edited by wakeeater on July 24, 2006)

sorry to hear about the boat, we slowed didnt stop but theres not much you can do when there are a bunch of boats around already..... and yea that sandbar by union point is a nasty one. tell everyone you know stay way left or way right!!

I can't beleive more people didn't offer help. We (my family) have offered help many times. I just figured everyone did.
That's too bad about the boat, but if it is totalled it would be sweet to buy it cheap and make it a project boat.
I hope everything works out for the boat owner and good job Teri for helping out.

I thought Sanger's weren't supposed to sink?

yeah -- i thought the rubrail was about as far under as these rascals would go -- any nwer wakeboat for that matter.

How does this happen? Take 4 or 5 wakes over the side? Driver error? Driver stupidity?

any boat will sink with enough water in her, I remember last year a BU forgot thier plug at New Melones and they did not notice as they were filleing the tanks just 20 ft from the dock waiting for friends, I asked how many hidden fat sack he had, and he said none. I said wow I never seen a BU sit so deep in the water with stock ballast, The light turned on in his head "I FORGOT THE PLUG" yeah as the water was almost at hit rub rail..

As for people not being good boaters and stopping to help "THATS BS" I would have gotten so mad had I seen this going on and gotten on my bullhorn and parked my boat right in the middle of the waterway to make people slow down.

This was totally avoidable, we all have to remember our manning and respect. I am sure people would have been mad had it been their mother,sister, grandmother,etc on that boat!

Most boats will sit at the rubrail in ideal conditions. No waves, no additional ballast. Usually what happens and I suspect it was the case there is that one large yaht wake over takes the boat, making it very succeptible to other boat wakes. Once it's sitting very low all it take is a couple wakeboats wakes over the gunnel to finish it off.

Usually is due to an inexperienced driver, but I've been on the water my whole life and have almost been capsized by a yaht wake. It's a scary moment when you see a wall of water coming your way.

Definitely one of the perils of being in the Delta. Very unfortunate for that individual. Karma will definitely pay back those that didn't respect or help them in their time of need.

"I would have gotten so mad had I seen this going on and gotten on my bullhorn and parked my boat right in the middle of the waterway to make people slow down."

This section of the river is about 1000 feet wide. So rollers were coming from everywhere.

I agree with Evan....lack of experience. Even my years of Delta experience were tested this weekend. There were huge boats everywhere and they weren't slowing down for Shiat. I'd say it's even harder to navigate a Sanger through these conditions because of how low they sit.

A 2006 though??? Ouch...that sucks

One of my buddies boat sank about 5 years ago, very close to the same area and same problem as well with a yacht wake. This friend was in there late 30's and had 15 + years of boat driving experiance in the delta alone....

Sometimes the Yachts around that area DREDGE, meaning they go 10 mph and produce HUGE HUGE HUGE wakes, most time they can be avoided but sometimes with high traffic n multiple cruisers wakes can't be avoided & once you take one over the bow its over.... The first one will literally fill the boat up & if the next 2 hit, it will usually flip it over.... The Yachts are responsible for the wakes & need to drive at a speed that is responsible & safe for other boaters but just as we have wallys on wakeboats, they have them on the cruisers as well.

I have been close a couple times but thankfully have always been able to navigate through em!


Lzy

CIE that was more of an emotial comment than anything. I just HATE to hear about RUDE people. every summer I end up towing atleast 4-7 people who break down on the water. One day I might need a tow.

just remember pay it forward..

Glad everyone is okay. Hopefully there were no children in the boat and if there was, they better have had life jackets on. Perfect reminder that this stuff does happen and nothing pisses me off more than seeing kids/babies on board without a life vest on.

$het happens, even to experienced boat owners...

Example, the knobs that wake surf down the middle of a narrow channel causing a huge wake for a stupid "sport". Wakesurfing on the delta should be on the bigger channels with the rest of waves. Keep the side channels open for glassy butter runs.

I'm with you Tommer.

Hey, BTW...should the vessel that caused this problem been responsible for damages?

You ARE responsible for your own wake.

I know a guy here in Arizona, on the Parker Strip had to pay $8,600 for damaged docks and boats that his wake damaged. It took about 5 minutes in court to find him guilty. Clarkson V. The State of Arizona I think...

Ok, Back to boating 101, Could driver position boat to avoid so much water? I have never had to deal with wall's of water from yachts. Throttle up and take them head on? or turn sideways and "roll with it". Thank's!

I thought it was the law that you must stop and offer assistance.

And I wholeheartedly agree with paying it forward.

Two things, its the law, you must stop and help a boater in distress. If pass them and not offer help, you are can be sited and ticketed.

boating 101, at least from my expierence, get the nose up as high as you can, or try and roll with them in a foward to side motion with the nose up. Yo can power with the nose up and roll with it going foward and moving your wheel back and forth and to help with the roll. If your nose is down, and those big rollers are coming and you are even in idle foward... you will get a deck wash. Retreat as far as you can away... even duck into anywhere, side channel.

Thank's for the info Tommer!

I had this happen to myself with our old boat a few years ago. We had my daughter who was 3 months old in the boat, and this massive 110+ foot yacht came barreling through this really narrow channel in the Delta. INSANE amount of water came into the boat, and my wife had to hold the baby up in the air to keep her safe. I ended up keeping the front end up and just had my Bilge working.. luckily we were able to get all the water out as I had the boat leaning back as much as possible to get the water back to the bilge area. Its pretty crazy to have it happen and experience it. I thought for sure we were going to sink.

Jesse, that's a huge part of the problem. Wakes from yacht's are frequently different sizes and spaced differently. There isn't any one right answer. Generally you can power up until your boat is on full plane (bow pointed straight up) and cruise over them. The problem arises when the wake is big enough that you lose plane going down the back of the wave and you nose into the second wave.

The scariest experience I've had was from a very large yacht that was moving fast. As he approached I couldn't see much of any waves, so I didn't think anything of it. I thought I could just roll over them sideways. When he got close I could see that he was creating a huge well of water behind the bow roller. I powered up (full throttle) from the top of the first roller, got airborn and landed on the upside of the second. It was pretty wicked. Knocked all the boards out of their racks, bent one board rack and cracked the tower. To this day I'm sure I would've sunk the boat had I not responded the way I did.

Another part of the problem is that you don't have room to plane lightly drive away from the yacht's. With the Delta being narrow you only have so much room till you have to deal with a wave head on or hit a leavy.

There's definitely a lot to the equation and if you're smart you can generally avoid the situation by not being on one of the sloughs where the big boats go, but if you play at the delta for long enough you'll run into some huge waves first hand eventually.

MAN,I had a couple experiences with yacht's wakes and let me tell you it is scary scary.

I had about 700lbs of led in the nose when one of my experiences happened.(Not good)but I got out of there without water in the boat but a couple of bruised kidneys.LOL I thought.....DAMN that sucked,I almost wrecked my boat how hard it hit the water but reading this story,I made out like a bandit especially with 700lbs in the nose.

Charely I don't see a need to remove the pictures the boat isn't really showing and they've already been posted. I was specifically asked by the boat owner to take photo's for potential insurance reasons and was specifically asked not to post on the web! So I would now ask out of respect and wishes of the boat owner to those of you who do have photo's please don't post them, you wouldn't apperciate it if this was you. Yes, I was on the green Mastercraft.

In this particular situation who exactly is to blame is really a gamble, the yatch or one of the three wakeboard boats who passed to close or the boat driver?! Was the driver inexperience or was it caused from driver stupidity; NIETHER. The driver like myself has had many years on the Delta, just a fluke accident. As Evan has stated yatch size and wake distance varies with each yatch, not to mention cross wakes from other boats. Those of you who are familiar with this section of Indian Slough and Discovery Bay enterance know just how busy this section can be. At one point we had over 30 boats slowed to an idle and passing, a majority were headed back in to Orwood.

There were no children on board, there were however two dogs on board (one small and one medium sized)and they were able to swim ashore with the passengers and later placed in our boat and taken home where the could recover from heat exhaustion, it was after all 116 degrees!

I don't think any specific brand of boat is exempt from sinking, unless it's of course one of those fancy Ranger Bassboats; you know the one's they show on TNN with sections cut out claiming they are unsinkable! It is to my understanding that any boats under 20 foot requires internal floation injected into the hull of the boat (please correct me here if I am wrong) and any boat over 20.1 foot does not require floatation. Regardless once a boat takes on the a certain amount of water she's bound to go down. Aaron or Evan did a great job above explaining taking water on and taking more water on from passing boats, whether wakeboard boats or not.

I'm in full agreement that wake surfing should be done in main channels or in wider channels and not in main wakeboarding area's such as Victoria's and good days.

I hate to say this but while the boat owner and I sat on the tower and waited for Vessel Assist we did have about 10 jetski's stop and offer us a ride to the dock to make whatever phone calls we needed. The sad thing was that little to no BOATS stopped and those who did were more concerned with what exactly happened and what kind of boat it was vs. if were we okay or did we need help!

As Stephani said $hiat happens, bad timing, wrong place at the wrong time etc. I've said it before and I'll say it again I'm a firm believer of karma and a firm believer of paying it forward! I'm just glad that we were there to help and more so that every one came out okay!

(Message edited by jetgofish on July 24, 2006)

I think that one other thing to be learned from this lesson is that everyone can and should sign up for vessel assist. I believe that it's not too expensive and it helps insure that the service is available when you may be the one needing it.

Something I found out that I did not know. The larger yachts are supposed to yeild and power down for smaller vessels. The problem is there is never a Sheriff or Coast Guard vessel around to catch them.

And hey J-rod my 215 sits about as high as your X2.

Gary,

Even with Coast Guard and Sheriff present this isn't enforced. We were up at Manderville over the 4th weekend, ton's of yatchs vs. smaller vessels CG and Sheriff were present and they witnessing "plowing" yatchs vs. smaller vessels; from what I witnessed not one yatch was stopped or ticketed!

Seems like no matter what the situation the bigger guy always wins!

(Message edited by jetgofish on July 24, 2006)

Scary stuff! P-Ditty and J-Z should stay in Miami, and keep away from the delta. For real though I'm glad everyone's ok, and hope dude gets his boat back soon.

Maybe the safest thing to do with a yacht wake if you're not sure how to drive it is come to a full stop and just let it roll by you. Unless it's literally breaking like surf it may give you a ride but won't generally come over your rail.

One of the funniest things I have seen on Indian Slough was a VLX hitting a yacht wake at full speed and getting literally a good 3-4 feet of air (between it's prop and the water, not just at the bow). That's something you don't see everyday!

I saw a boat stuck on a sandbar (I presume) outside of Union Point yesterday for the first time as Teri mentioned. I was unaware that obstacle existed there even though I go by there quite a bit, very alarming stuff.

I also remember back in the day when I began to ride in the Delta, and first encountered those crazy yachts. Dealing with those wakes is very stressful and dangerous

Yea driving a ski boat in rough ocean like conditions is not fun. We have the cross the biscayne bay to get to our riding spot in miami, and between the huge fishing boats and yatch it get pretty crazy. Here are some pics when we decided to see if we could ride from the spot through the bay all the way to the dock ... bout 25 - 40 mins of chop at wakeboard speeds... i made it for about 30mins lol.

Gary, where did you find out about yachts being required to give way? I have never seen that anywhere and it would be good to know. Thanks. Mike

Rule of the ocean is the more nimble the vessel requires it to give way. basically ... Sail boats are always right (assuming they are flying sails) then it works its way down. A Jet Ski need to get the F out the way of a yatch and so on...

Hello All. I am new to this site. I got here from a cross user on another board. We have recovered many ski boats in the delta area. I have lots of cool photos.
I was one of the guys that raised this boat. The only real point I wanted to make after reading the above posts is this...
A Vessel Assist (VA) membership will not cover this type of service. The coverage needed for this work is something covered by your hull/liability insurance, not by towing membership. A VA membership is a valuable thing for non-emergency service. Such as fuel deliveries, jumpstarts, or routine tows back to the ramp. I am happy to answer any questions on this thread or any other topic. I hope I have not offend admin with any advertising issues.
Thank You.
mail to:vaaadelta@aol.com
925-382-4422 24hr Cell

This one was down in N. Victoria Canal a while back.

you should share some more photos of your collection... and maybe tell a story or two regarding a few of them

Its pretty obvious that that wake boat went down because of the rough water conditions! not!

Long ago a buddie's low profile boat started going down. The rear corner was just about to go under when the very quick thinking owner grabbed the ice chest, dumped the contents, flipped it over and pushed it under the rear corner. That bought us enough time to hook a bow line to another boat and start dragging it. It had a rear transom plug that we removed after it was moving, allowed the water to drain so we could get it back on the trailer.

In all of these situations think people first then equipment.

Philip, we will forgive your blatant use of free advertising if you post more pics.

...well, I will at least!

Thanks for that phone #, always good to have, just in case...

Phillip - thanks for the 411 - I have the # in my cell phone now. Hopefully we will never need to use it, but better to be like a boyscout - always prepared ;)

Keep in mind that the phone number is attached to a fairly expensive tow...unless you are a member, or have some other coverage in place. The other coverage usually means you pay me up front and seek reimbursement later.

keep the pics coming..

Phil - you guys did a great job in recovery on Saturday! Took a few tries, I was more amazed in how quickly you guys made the recovery!

Thanks again!

I was following the boat when it took on about 5-6 good waves from the yatch. I attemted to use my fat sac pump to help, but the waves from the boats passing by were coming over the side. Everyone was ok, and we told the owner we would be posting the pics of his boat on here so he is ok with it. Remember to slow down when you see big yatchs passing, he was going to fast and was diving bow first through all the waves. See yea on the delta... I will be posting a few pics when i get them onto my computer.

The ski boats with the big towers are a bit top heavy when full of water. We got waked once, right at the critical moment....flip. The one in the first picture above got pulled over by another boat when it ran over the tow line after a wake boarder fell. That's a long leverage arm. Dumped everyone in the drink really quick.

This one was just plain old navigation error onto the rocks at Alameda Air Station.



(Message edited by vessel_assist on July 28, 2006)

Most ski boats we deal with don't sink like the original one in this thread do...usually the float upside down. In fact they are usually VERY stable upside down once they get floaded...like this one.

damm.. this is sounding like this is a regular occurance??

Philip,
Did you take any pics of the old pick-up you recovered from the Holland ramp a couple weeks ago? I watched the recovery and could definately tell that it wasn't your first clam bake. It took longer to secure funds then to get the truck out. Keep up the great work. Next time I see you at Paradise I'll buy you a cold one.

If you check out the thread in the boating section called something like "massive hitch failure"...there are some shots of it there.
Thanks for the kind words! Do you play in the Paradise Tuesday Game?

vessel assit you guys do awesome work keep it up.

These photos are turning my stomach. What a nightmare that would be!!!

No, what is it?

Texas Hold'em.

Now you're talking. Maybe next Tuesday.