In an average year, fewer than 1,000 people in the US and Canada are accidentally shot by hunters with only about 75 of those leading to a fatality. Most of those fatalities are unfortunately self-inflicted by hunters due to slips, trips, and falls who shoot themselves with their own weapon. Fatality numbers have improved in recent years according to the International Hunter Education Association. Hopefully this downward tick on the graph can be attributed to extensive hunter education programs throughout the country. Most of these hunting accidents across the country aren't directly related to firearms, its other activities associated with hunting that kill or injure hunters such as heart attacks, ATV accidents and the most popular injury......... falling from tree stands. A survey in Indiana showed that 55 percent of all hunting-related accidents in the state were related to tree stands. Wear a damn harness people! It shouldn't be surprising that the majority of fatal accidental shootings involve the use of shotguns or rifles when engaged in deer hunting. Let's face it, in most states the deer woods can be super scary on the opening day of firearms season, especially if you are hunting public land. I had an almost deadly encounter with a moron some years back which is why I won’t hunt public land on opening day any more. But there is a more deadly killer among us duck hunters. Sure there is the accidental swing and discharge of the shotgun into another hunter in the blind, or the stories we hear of mans best friend stepping on an unattended shotgun and shooting a hunter but a far more serious fatality that isn't even accounted for in national record keeping across North America is the Broken Heart.
When the Broken Heart occurs, it can lead to a myriad of other serious events such as bad decisions at shooting at flying game, or just general carelessness with your firearm. The Broken Heart can lead to relationship failures as you continue to pursue your quarry even harder, staying out later, or immediately planning another hunt without consulting your spouse or significant other which can always lead to friction in the relationship. The broken heart clouds your intelligents and leads to bad decision, after bad decision. My most serious instance of a broken heart decision happened some years back when a friend and I were hunting off a river in the Cheasapeak Bay. We had done poorly for a few weeks leading up to this day but a severe cold snap had us eager and excited to get out. The ice had set in so we drug a canoe about a mile through the woods to get to our spot. After our first volley with birds that morning we decided to let them lie and we would make one retrieve of our birds at the end of the hunt. Well nature called for me so I grabbed some toilet paper and set out to find a log. 15 minutes later I walked back to the blind to find my partner out in the canoe. Before I even had the chance to cuss him out for being an idiot, I watched him reach too far out over the gunwale to get a bird and the canoe capsized. I was witnessing my worst nightmare. A 250 lb man wearing waders, and no life jacket struggling in the freezing water. Horrified, I watched him struggle while I stood on shore 30 yards away. As I watched him unable to pull himself up onto the ice or break the ice I began to panic. I began to take off my jacket and waders to go after him when all of a sudden I realized that the line we had used to pull the canoe through the woods was only 15 yards away from me and still attached to the canoe. I rushed out crashing through the ice. I screamed for my friend to grab the canoe as I raced through the ice chunks back to shore. I ran down the shore to where he had put the canoe in and prayed that I could pull the canoe right back through the broken ice. The lord was watching down on us that day as I pulled my hunting partner out of the frigid Chesapeake Bay. I rushed him back to our blind out of the wind where we stripped him of his wet clothes and I wrapped him in an emergency blanket, an item my grandfather always made me carry out in the woods when I was younger. I rushed to find the lighter in my blind bag and some material to start a fire. With the fire burning and my friend warming up we made the decision that I would leave him, return to our trucks, and I would retrieve his spare clothes. I made the round trip in about 30 minutes. When I returned, he was better but still cold. I put everything I could find that would burn on that fire and helped my friend into dry clothes. It was 2 PM before we were able to make our way back to our trucks that day and we left the canoe which was never seen again. That day scared the crap out of both of us, for me especially. I took it hard because I was the more seasoned hunter and I didn't look out for him and wasn't there to ward off his bad decision to go out there on his own. To this day I am extremely careful when I hunt and I’m not a big fan of going at it alone, especially when winter has set in.
Now all humor aside, I shared those stats and that story to get you thinking because an accident can make a good day turn bad in a hurry. But there are some ways that you can help to protect not only yourself but those around you as well. Most of us have a specific way we pack our boats the night before a hunt and we methodically throw everything we may need for the next day. We have a mental checklist to ensure there is no decoy left behind but accidents can happen in a split second and being prepared can be the difference between life and death. As eager and willing as we are to pack all of our hunting gear, we should be equally concerned with ensuring we have a standard outfit of safety items for you and your hunting partners.
Below is a list of some Items you should use or ensure they are working properly in respect to your boat;
1.) Wear a damn life jacket!
- Don‘t just ensure they are in the boat. Make sure they are the proper size for the intended wearer. A type III life jacket is comfortable and provides sufficient buoyancy provided it is used correctly. Ensure it is U.S. Coast Guard approved and the size and weight is applicable to the person that will be wearing it. They even make them in camo patterns now if that will make you feel better. My boat doesn't get underway during duck season unless everyone is wearing their life jacket.
2.) Use a kill switch lanyard.
- Many states are making it a requirement to be worn by the operator. Its been a necessity for manufactures to install on open boats for years. They clip on to you somewhere so if you fall overboard or are ejected the engine will shut down. I clip mine to my life jacket that I'm always wearing.
3.) Navigation Lights
- Those were probably the red and green things you spray painted over when you were repainting your boat last summer or took off and proceeded to use the wiring for when you installed your sweet 1 trillion candle power light bar on the bow. Those navigation lights need to be there depending on the size of your boat. In addition, if your required to run a stern light, make sure you have that displayed properly AND IT WORKS.
4.) Sound Producing Device
- Another requirement for your vessel. Whether your boat has an installed horn, you purchased the horn in a can from your local marine store or you use a hand held whistle, a sound producing device is typically required. I use plastic whistles because metal rusts and I don’t use the ones with a ball in them. The cork ball corrodes over time and breaks apart. My whistles don’t even have a ball in them. I have one affixed to a lanyard by my console and another attached to my life jacket.
5.) Anchor
- An anchor is typically not a requirement for most small vessels but always a great thing to have. I keep two on my boat. One is a 6 lb danforth anchor and the other is a 25 lb byers anchor because you just never know when you need weight and when you need to hook into a mud flat. In addition, I carry 100 ft of anchor line.
6.) Boating safety course
- Almost every states requires operators of motor propelled vessels to have had successfully completed an approved boating safety course. Each state has their own regulations pertaining to whom needs one but honestly, these courses offer a ton of information. Some of the worst boating accidents I’ve ever seen have involved people that had been running a boat back in the day with Noah and the Ark and ”didnt need to take a course”.
Now there are a ton of other items that I could include in this list like make sure you have two boat plugs, always ensure you have a tool kit, a radio isn’t required but works better in the long run than a cell phone, and always sail with flares but my list isn’t meant to be all encompassing. As a matter of fact, this list is just things that I saw at the boat ramp over the course of last season that made me chuckle but could have been a disaster for someone else. (The story of the kill switch lanyard is by far the funniest thing I've ever seen). One of my favorite spots to hang out is a busy boat ramp on a Saturday morning in the summer with my coffee just to watch people launch their boats so I can get a good laugh at the stupid things I see. But seriously, take the time to put together a box of safety gear for your boat. And another important part of that is ensuring that everyone on your boat knows what gear you have and where its located.
So the moral of the story here is safety. Accidents are going to happen there is no doubt about it, but we can often mitigate not only the accidents but the severity of them by always being prepared when they occur so that a bad day doesn't turn worse in an instant.
Stay safe out there friends, and always be cautious of the other guy!
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