Rescued pikers!

[Peter Waller]

Rough it was! White horses whipping down the Broad, and another boat going backwards against the onslaught! Exciting stuff as I surfed my dory down the Broad. As for the other boat, a small 12, maybe 14 foot long cabin dinghy with a 35lb thrust leccy motor, and no oars, the pratts! Oars would have given them more power than the leccy. Only to pleased to oblige fellas, throw us your rope.

 

The moral of the story is a simple one. If you are going out onto open water then be prepared for the worst.

 

It blew up quickly today and their leccy was not man enough, they were not prepared, they couldn't cope. Like many pikers that are new to boats, they just didn't know any better.

 

It all turned out okay, but I was the only other boat out there. It could have been nasty.

[rickster]

you see that far to often on the broads, esp with the hire craft they get their hours tutiton then thats it their off, racing down the river then they realise they dont have brakes or they dont take in to consideration of the wind and tides etc, or worse still they dont even follow basic navigation ie give way to sailing boats, keep within the channel markers or keep on the right side of the river.

My perants live near acle and the amount of things we have seen on the river there or at potter heigham or better still braydon waters

[Peter Waller]

Breydon can be like the open sea! Not a place to be at the wrong time. Sometimes its closed to hire craft, just for their own safety. The hirers can see that it looks like Dante's Inferno yet they create hell because they can't cross it! Water is not always our best friend.

[Tog]

Is it not time we had a 'boat licence' requirement?

RNLI down this way has had more 'shouts' than ever and that's discounting all the prats that 'samaritans' pick up who's shouts don't get recorded. (I've tugged a few home in my time - one of which we took from off Cowes to the Hamble and the b'stard did'nt even offer us a drink!!)

 

I suggest pulling e'm to safety & telling them to get a 'commercial' 'tug' back - If not you could be accused of doing it 'for hire or reward' and if something untoward were to occur your insurance company could get shirty.

[rickster]

I too have pulled to many a boat from the sandbanks on Breydon, reedham and st olvaes (sp) is another to see capt hapless make big mistake due to inexperiance and may be just pure stupidity.