A bad day fishing is better than a good day at work?

[Idlespeedonly]

This poor guy was fishing on the Tennessee River.
He was probably going around 50 when he hit a stump.
The river is pretty nice when the water level is up, but it is pretty dangerous when they drop it.
Luckily he didnt have a passenger with him when it happened, otherwise somebody might have not made it.

 

[jbcurt00]

oops

Carp happens ^^^, that's one of the reason's I'm so hard on people that post 'Can I use it as is w/ soft spots @ the deck or a 'starting to rot' transom?'

Yep, could have been significantly worse:

That boat w that OB is probably capable of even more then 50mph, so yeah, could've been much worse

 

[H20Rat]

oops

Carp happens ^^^, that's one of the reason's I'm so hard on people that post 'Can I use it as is w/ soft spots @ the deck or a 'starting to rot' transom?'

Not saying it doesn't happen or isn't dangerous, but losing a motor off the transom because of rot is actually very, very rare. Fiberglass can put up with LOTS of flex before it fails. In this scenario, doesn't matter how strong things were, something was going to give. (transom survived, jack plate, not so much...)

 

[redneck joe]

admittedly my part of the TN river stays up all the time but to me seems like a boat like that wiht all those electronics would know that he was in a normal shallow then the depth finder could tell him really shallow and I wouldn't be running 5o until I got to the channel

 

[MH Hawker]

Not necessarily Joe. Several years ago I hit a dead head while running around 45 mph in 200 feet of water that destroyed my LU and bent a rod in the motor.

 

[Idlespeedonly]

Where we are at, you could be in 60' of water then 20 foot later be in 5'.
The bottom can come up and hit you pretty quick.


​

 

[southkogs]

^^^^ Kinda. Especially on the TN River, the main channel is marked and kept (relatively) clear for the commercial traffic. Hittin' a widow maker floating along (especially after a rain) is one thing - and rather understandable, but nailin' a stump typically means you're off the main drag.

I've caught the bottom a couple of times on Priest, so no judgement passing here. However, it's not uncommon here in Tennessee that folks (particularly bass boats) go wailin' along at 50 - 70MPH in water that they "think" is deep enough. Eat a log in the channel running along, and I can understand why you wouldn't have seen that coming ... but off the beaten path down one of the fingers of the river at 50+ MPH? You're kinda' askin' for it, ain'tcha'?

 

[redneck joe]

yeah a log is different than a stump and I have seen at it Guntersville - off the channel can be 9' or less in an areas as big as many lakes (with humps less) and they are screaming along. Guntersville has a max historical swing of 3' so you probably can get away with it more there than say up towards Knoxville or down by Decatur. And my point was about having electronics to A) know where you are and B) know how deep.

 

[jbcurt00]

Not saying it doesn't happen or isn't dangerous, but losing a motor off the transom because of rot is actually very, very rare. Fiberglass can put up with LOTS of flex before it fails. In this scenario, doesn't matter how strong things were, something was going to give. (transom survived, jack plate, not so much...)

And a motor directly thru bolted to a soft transom might hit a much less substantial submerged log and that would be enough to do serious damage. All because CARP like this DOES happen. Rare or not, it IS possible.....

I don't drive w/ brakes that give a soft feel at the pedal, or don't work at all, and don't recommend any one drive under those conditions.

All the same for me: operation of damaged, unsafe vehicles.

I suspect that if you asked the owner/operator of the boat this Topic is about, he's done whatever he was doing, countless times before. Exactly the same way, along the same path, at the same speed, successfully numerous times. But not on this day.