ya i have left them out a few times, in a mater of a minute or two your sinking fast.
+1
To be completely honest, this is not the type of boat that you trailer in and out for every use. This boat is likely stored in the water for the duration of the boating season. You’ll notice the boat is painted with bottom paint on the underneath (to prevent barnacles and other build-up), which is standard practice for boats that are in the water for the entire season. So they we’re probably just taking it out of storage and around to their marina. Hence the “XXXXXX MARINE” on the side of the tow truck.
I still want to know how it sank though. Obviously it made it off the trailer but didn’t last very long. There would have to be a SERIOUS leak for the boat to take on enough water to do that.
ohh nooooo
sterndrive bellows?
+1.
No way you’d sink it right at launch just because of the drain plug unless you launched it and then left it sitting there. And who just leaves a boat sitting at the launch? Besides that almost all boats that are kept in the water have automatic bilge pumps and that would have kept up with at least half the water that would come in from a missing plug.
I don’t know many tow personal tow vehicles up to the task of pulling a boat that size half submerged out of the water. Water is 8.35lb/s gallon. How many gallons of water do you think a boat that size can hold? 2000 probably? My little 6 man hot tub holds close to 500 and it has WAY less interior space than a boat that sized. My guess is 2000 is way low but even that is 16700 lbs. Plus the weight of the boat and trailer.
Could be something bad back there, but how the fuck does that happen?
There aren’t many tow vehicles that can handle a boat that size WITHOUT being full of water.
^+1 on even more than 2k gallons… my little kidney shaped pool holds ~10k gallons.
People forgot how heavy water is. After getting caught in a crazy downpour while having dinner at dockside my 18 footer filled up to just below the floor. In the short trip back to Niawanda the bilge pump had barely pumped it down at all and my 5.4 V8 Expedition really lugged to pull that thing up the ramp and needed 4wd. This a truck that normally doesn’t even know the boat is back there.
I’m guessing when the pulled that boat out they did it a little at a time to give the water some time to drain out. If they yanked it right straight out there’s a good chance all that water weight could blow the transom right out.
That’s really weird. The boat looks brand new. As mentioned, a boat like that only gets launched and retrieved once per year (hence the commercial launch vehicle) yet it has no lake scum on the hull. That only takes a couple of days. It really looks like they just put the thing in for the season and it immediately started to sink.
The tow vehicle says Collins Marine. They have fork lifts and one of those strap based drive over crane systems right at their marina at the Grand Island bridge so I highly doubt it was being launched at Ontario St by Collins.
So if this did launch at Ontario I’m guessing the Collins truck was called in because the original launch vehicle wasn’t going to stand a chance pulling that sunken boat up the ramp.
More likely, this thing sunk somewhere else and Ontario was the closest launch to bring it to.
EDIT:
PRETTY SURE THIS IS IT
Five Rescued from Sinking Boat in Niagara River
Rachel Kingston Reporting
Buffalo, NY (WBEN) – The U.S. Coast Guard had to rescue five people from the Niagara River late Friday night, after the boat they were on began to sink.
The Coast Guard Command Center was notified just after 11:30 that a group of boaters was in trouble. Rescuers located the sinking vessel in the water between the Peace Bridge and the International Railroad Bridge.
All five people who had been onboard the boat were taken to shore at Harry’s Harbour Place. Two women suffered minor cuts bruises, after they were thrown from the sinking boat.
A towing service has removed the 30-foot boat from the river. A Coast Guard officer tells WBEN it’s still unclear why the vessel sank.
That’s about a 30 foot boat and Harry’s is right next to the Ontario St ramp. If you had a mostly sunk boat between the Peace Bridge and railroad bridge Ontario St would be the closest ramp to bring it to.
Yeah, that makes a lot of sense. They could have hit something and limped it back to a ramp.
Thrown from the boat?
Must have hit something.
I’m starting to wonder if the outdrive got ripped right off. That would open a hole big enough to sink it in a hurry. 
What are the chances they could even make it back to a ramp if that happened? That thing would hit the bottom FAST if they ripped a hole that big in the transom.
They didn’t make it back to the ramp though, it was towed in. I’m wondering if it was built with enough flotation to keep it from going right to the bottom. Maybe it’s only sitting up as high as it is in the picture because it’s part way up on the trailer? It wouldn’t matter how big a hole it had in the transom in the pictures considering the entire back end of the boat is below the waterline. Once any one of the 4 sides of your boat get under water the lack of holes stops mattering.
Crazy. Thrown from the boat? Something violent happened. Maybe they didn’t know the area and went ripping through the shallows near the mouth of the river and hit rocks, then floated past the peace bridge?
That would be my guess. There’s isn’t really much to hit between the railroad bridge and the peace bridge. But just past the peace bridge is that massive rock shoal that people constantly get in trouble on. If you hit that it would only take a couple minutes to drift back past the peace bridge. Someone should swing over to Collins today and see if it’s outside and get some pictures of the transom. Next time I’m in there I’ll ask about it (bought my boat from there).
That’s right around the corner from here. Sounds like a good way to spend a lunch break. Besides I’ve been meaning to pick up a pair of step-pads for the edge of the hull. :tup:
I watch people get so close to the bridge piers with big boats. I think they forget just how much shit is down there, those piers are far from clean faces all the way to the bottom, rocks were piled around them to help with errosion.