Keeping Risks on the River at Bay

Deputy Dave Smith shook his head as he watched a young teenager on a Sea Doo watercraft putter through open water toward Havasu Landing, oblivious to the speed boats cutting across the lake at breakneck speed.

At that very spot two weeks ago, a speedboat and a 32-foot catamaran collided head-on, killing a 10-year-old Moorpark boy and his father.

“Failure to maintain proper lookout is a huge problem out here, and it’s the cause -- with alcohol use -- of 95% of the accidents we see,” said Smith, steering his San Bernardino County sheriff’s marine boat along the 90 miles of the river he patrols. “These are people who only need to use the same skills they use when they’re driving a car, but it’s like when they get on the water, they hang their brain out to the side.”

Thousands of Southern Californians are expected to swarm to this popular stretch of the Colorado River this Fourth of July weekend, cutting loose and clogging the waterway in a sun-baked, wild floating party.

It’s a hazardous mix that has led to five deaths on the water since September, and authorities say they will be out in force this weekend to crack down on the drunken and out-of-control boaters that are most often to blame.

Those crowds used to be limited to long holiday weekends, but now, with more and more Southern Californians vacationing close to home, congestion has become common.

On almost any weekend, Smith said, he sees young teenagers on personal watercraft zipping by at almost 70 miles an hour, and boaters cruising down the Colorado while swigging beers -- which is legal on the water -- and leering at bikini-clad women instead of watching the water ahead.

“It’s so popular that every summer weekend at the river is like a holiday weekend,” said sheriff’s spokeswoman Cindy Beavers. “There’s also nothing stopping you from buying a $150,000 boat that goes 100-plus mph and putting it on the water for the first time you’ve ever driven a boat.”

On June 16, Steven Patchett, 48, and his 10-year-old son Tyler were traveling at about 60 mph in their catamaran when it smashed into a slower-moving 23-foot boat near Havasu Landing. The Patchetts both died, and another family member was seriously injured.

Last weekend, at a popular gathering spot known as the Sandbar, a speedboat plowed over a pontoon boat, and one of the injured was airlifted to a nearby hospital in serious condition. North of that crash, two people on personal watercraft crashed into one another, sending both to a hospital.

Downriver, three people from Orange County were killed in a two-boat collision along the Parker Strip in September.

There is no speed limit on the river. Law enforcement officials can only cite boaters traveling at “unsafe” speeds or those who violate speed restrictions inside marked “no-wake zones.”

“It’s getting so crazy out here because people who don’t know how to drive boats are renting them and showing no responsibility, and the young, dumb kids on the Sea-Doos are only making it worse,” said Jimmy Dahl, a former Redondo Beach resident in his mid-40s now living in Lake Havasu City, Ariz.

Sitting on his pontoon boat sipping a beer, Dahl said people have a right to have fun, but they need to keep it under control.

“I had 15 people on my boat the other day, and we had a great time. I’m drinking beer now, but I was drinking Gatorade on that day,” he said. “I’m like everyone. The best day for me is to drink a cold beer and to see something naked.... But don’t be so stupid.”

Along the channel that runs underneath Lake Havasu’s international landmark, the transplanted London Bridge, boaters dock en masse with others cruising through slowly to party, flirt and wade.

A thick cloud of engine exhaust results, and carbon monoxide emissions get so high that the Lake Havasu City Police Department twice closed the channel to all boat traffic during the Memorial Day holiday. The city recently installed carbon monoxide monitors in the channel.

Last year, before the monitors were in place, two Southern Californians drowned in the channel on holiday weekends, with the noxious air and alcohol use suspected as causes of death, said Lake Havasu City Police Lt. Dan Doyle.

“They can be drinking while hanging onto a boat one second, and under the water the next, and nobody really notices because there’s so much going on in that channel,” sheriff’s spokesman Beavers said.

Law enforcement officials said they also are concerned about the river’s inherent distractions for teenagers and children -- wild tourists, speeding watercraft and breathtaking scenery -- and blamed parents for not taking more precautions.

Deputies have stopped 10-year-olds driving personal watercraft, rented from local businesses that rely on parents giving their children’s true ages.

“It’s like parents giving their kids the keys to a motorcycle and letting them drive full speed through traffic on the 91 Freeway,” Smith said. “They don’t do it at home, but they do it out here.”

The surging popularity of teak surfing and other towing sports, such as wakeboarding, resulted in a 38% increase in towing accidents from 2002 to 2003 in California, said David Johnson, spokesman for the California Department of Boating and Waterways.

Among the three states linked to the river’s most popular spot, only Nevada has instituted a law requiring boat operators born after January 1983 to obtain an operator’s certificate. The certificate is given for completion of a six- to eight-hour boating safety course approved by the National Assn. of State Boating Laws Administration.

“This was prompted by the fact that 80 to 85% of those involved in boating accidents never had training,” said Fred Messman, boating law administrator for the Nevada Department of Wildlife.

In California, a 1999 bill submitted by a boating task force would have required operators under age 40 to complete a course. It failed by veto, with then-Gov. Gray Davis saying he wasn’t convinced the test would reduce accidents or improve boat operating skills.