As an article of clothing, a personal flotation device is neither comfortable nor flattering. But unlike a gaudy event T-shirt, bikini or board shorts, it can save your life if you get pitched from a boat at high speed.
No one heads out for a poker run, or any go-fast boating event for that matter, expecting to die. And even if you do “die doing something you love”—not sure a more inane cliché exists—you’re still dead. Your love ones, assuming you have them, still have to cope with your sudden and most likely gruesome departure.
Will a PFD save your life if you get pitched out of a boat at 150 mph? There are no guarantees. But it is guaranteed that if you get pitched and die at that speed without a PFD, your dead body will sink unless someone grabs it before it does.
Assuming your corpse isn’t snagged on something at the bottom of the waterway, it will float to the surface in two to three days—the time it takes depends mostly on water temperature—as the gases created during human decomposition will cause it to bloat and expand.
Of course, no PFD can stop decomposition of the human body. But it can bring a corpse back to the surface immediately and save first-responders the unpleasant chore of searching for it in often murky water.
It also will save your friends and family the anguish of waiting for its retrieval.
Grotesque stuff for sure, but reality nonetheless. And it’s the sort of gritty reality that recently sent Florida Powerboat Club head Stu Jones into an open-letter tirade to high-performance marine industry. (Read the letter here.)
As for would-be event participants who don’t wear PFDs during Florida Powerboat Club events, Jones pulled exactly the right ego-based lever in his screed.
“No lifejackets on your crew?” he wrote. “No video or photos. Nothing The chopper crew is instructed to take the photo for proof of infraction. Then the content goes on the cutting room floor, never to be published.”
The good news, at least from the perspective of a guy who has the blessedly rare responsibility of reporting tragedies that occur during go-fast boating events? I’m seeing more and more people wearing PFDs during even loosely organized events.
My dear friend Mr. Jones may be observing things differently, and to be fair my observation is entirely anecdotal. Plus, his event sample size is larger. But that was my takeaway from participating in almost 40 events around the country last season.
In the process, I made a lot friends. I’d sure like to grow older with a lot of them in the coming years. Wearing a PFD doesn’t guarantee that, of course. But it does increase the odds.—Matt Trulio