Sept 17, 2024

As of Sunday September 15, after being open for comments for eleven days, there were only 35 responses to the Transport Canada website questionnaire that asked, “What are your thoughts on requiring recreational boaters to use PFDs/lifejackets?”

The worst thing our industry can do is to fail to participate in what might be a very important and impactful discussion. Will mandatory lifejacket wear negatively impact boating participation? A group of young people enjoying a sunny summer day on the lake wake boarding or water skiing, might be very resistant to all wearing their lifejackets. Their response if the weather was windy and rough, might be very different.  There will be comparisons to wearing a seatbelt in the car but a seatbelt is a small device that’s attached to the car and that one device will fit a 100-pound school girl or a 320-pound man. To accommodate that range of sizes with proper-fitting PFDs would require carrying an inventory of equipment onboard. Here is what we need to do…and do immediately.

First, think about this situation and respond to Transport Canada right now. There are other groups of people who have strongly-held opinions and they will be weighing in on this aggressively. Let’s not let other people decide what happens in our industry.

Some have said that even one boating death is too many. According to the Let’s Talk website, Canada averages 111 boating-related deaths each year. In a country as large as Canada, and with so many waterways and so many varied boating activities, 111 does not strike me as a large number.

I’m not being cavalier about this. It can be very difficult to do some boating activities like live-releasing a fish while wearing a lifejacket and the cold-water danger of early and late season fishing is also a big risk.  

Would that sense of escape and freedom that you get when sailing or just gliding over a still lake in the early morning in a canoe or a power boat, be taken away if you were wearing a PFD? On the other hand, some equate that freedom with cutting loose at a party, having a few drinks and going for a boat ride. Some aspects of human nature defy being controlled, with tragic results in some cases. The seatbelt may not save your life but it greatly improves the odds and so would wearing a PFD. That is a certainty for any people who are involved in a boating accident.

Where do you come down in this discussion?

Please stop and respond to this questionaire now. https://letstalktransportation.ca/lets-talk-making-personal-flotation-devices-lifejackets-mandatory-for-recreational-boaters

Andy Adams – Editor