Rights, freedoms and responsibilities of boating
May 27, 2025
From my earliest memories as a child, I felt that going out in the boat brought a great sense of freedom. Boating safety and parental guidance were not so much in focus back then. I don’t recall having a life jacket and I don’t recall being taught how to row or sail my dinghy. I just saw what my parents did and copied that. I could take the boat out on Lake Simcoe once I was strong enough to push it off the beach and into the lake. I did that at every opportunity and the sense of freedom and adventure was truly memorable.
That sense of freedom and adventure is something I think boaters still enjoy and cherish but we have more rules now. Some of them make very good sense. Engine cut-off switches are now standard equipment but from my experiences reviewing power boats down in Florida, I have often been a passenger in a centre console with 500+ horsepower that could bast past 50 mph easily. The helmsman demonstrating the boat rarely attached the lanyard for the engine cut-off switches. More rare than that is having the captain explain the boat’s safety features. I suppose they assume I’m an experienced boater and a professional but then, every boat is different and many have new systems. Don’t you think it would be a great idea to do a safety briefing before we take off?
Last week a Florida bill passed into law, banning overnight mooring in some areas and also preventing police from stopping vessels for random checks. Alcohol and drugs on board? No problem in Florida it seems.
‘Crazy upside-down world these days… When I searched for the information online, here is what came up:
GENERAL BILL by Appropriations Committee on Agriculture, Environment, and General Government; Trumbull
Vessels; Specifying that the Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission’s authorization to establish protection zones includes modifying the allowable means of certain vessel positioning to prevent significant harm to certain springs; prohibiting an officer from performing a vessel stop or boarding a vessel without probable cause; requiring the commission, in coordination with the Department of Highway Safety and Motor Vehicles, to create the “Florida Freedom Boater” safety inspection decal for specified purposes; creating the “Watercraft Energy Source Freedom Act”, etc.
Two big issues seem to be behind this; preventing boaters from mooring their raggedy old boat overnight, or for longer periods of time, in front of someone’s million-dollar waterfront mansion and also, preventing enforcement officers from performing a vessel stop or boarding a vessel without probably cause, and even giving boaters a decal to display that should ward-off the officers. Let’s not scare the tourists away!
I suppose that if they see a boat blast through a speed-restricted zone they can still stop the boat but beyond that, what else would give the officers probable cause for a vessel stop?
Florida Freedom Boater decals will be in great demand I suspect. With those, boating tourists can enjoy almost total freedom on the water. Party on!
Also last week, there was a story that I had to share (if you haven’t seen it). A man in Norway was asleep in his ocean-front cabin when about 5am, a 443-foot-long container ship beached mere feet from his cabin. Oops!
This link takes you to the CNN website where I first saw the story. “Container ship runs aground on man’s front lawn”
Anyway…we hope that your business got off to a solid start this past May 24 weekend. We are standing by our earlier prediction for a strong summer season across Canada but be prepared for the madness to continue!
Andy Adams – Editor
