[Waterbaby]

Originally Posted by Glove

I appreciate everyone's feedback, which seem agree with the perspective of valuing safety of human life over that of property. Perhaps I'll find some time to cruise by next weekend and strike up a calm, apologetic conversation with this person to make sure everyone's "cool," regarding the matter, since I have to pass this dock frequently. Perhaps he's got a "trigger finger" if not enough people drop fully down to headway speed in front of his dock/boat/beach....and my case the other day was the exception where it was reasonably justified.

I'd like to indulge the experienced boaters here with one more related question on a different scenario: thunder/lightning storm blows in faster than expected at 6:00 pm that together with the nearing of sunset leads to darkness, high wind, pouring rain, and lightning is striking all around within 3 -5 miles. Hoards of boaters are caught unexpectedly in the lightning storm. and everyone is fleeing to get off the water in a hurry. I see some boaters take down their pole light (running with just the bow lights), whereas others keep their pole light up....which looks like an awfully good target for lightning. What's the proper thing to do in this situation?

Glove, I think you definitely did the right thing -- safety first! As far as the property owner goes, I agree with others here, first and foremost you should have been offered a safe haven, not been yelled at like that. The ticket price of $55 is a low price to pay -- that's even if there were any MPs around to ticket you, they should probably have all been heading for safety themselves!

As far as keeping the pole light up or not -- I would definitely keep mine up and ON. In a situation like that, where everyone is rushing to safety, the more visibility my boat has the better. Also, keep this in mine -- high winds usually equal high swells; the pole light may be the only thing visible indicating a boat's presence if you are between swells.

Glad you made it to port safely and were able to start this thread, and happy boating!