26
CD544
Impact With Underwater Hazards
Reduce speed and proceed with caution whenever you’re driving a
boat in shallow water areas or in areas where the waters are
suspected of having underwater obstacles that could be struck by the
sterndrive or the boat bottom. The most important thing you can
do to help reduce injury or impact damage from striking a
floating or underwater object is control the boat speed. Under
these conditions, boat speed should be kept to a minimum
planing speed of (15 to 25 MPH).
Striking a floating/underwater object may result in an infinite number
of situations. Some of these situations could result in the following:
• The boat could move suddenly in a new direction. Such a sharp
change in direction or turn can cause occupants to be thrown out
of their seats or out of the boat.
• A rapid reduction in speed. This will cause occupants to be thrown
forward, even out of the boat.
• Impact damage to the sterndrive and/or boat.
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