An Unsinkable Argument Life Jackets Save Lives, But Boaters Still Don’T Like Them

More than half the people who die in U.S. boating accidents might be saved if they wore life jackets.

Yet, the answer was a resounding “no” when the U.S. Coast Guard recently asked whether boaters nationwide should be required to wear the safety devices.

Legislators in Idaho and Washington repeatedly have refused to join the 30 states in which children must wear life jackets while boating. At least one Eastern Washington child might have been saved this year if the state had such a law.

Boaters in all states must have life jackets handy for each person on board. Although laws vary from state to state, nowhere are all boaters required to wear life jackets under all conditions.

Also called “personal flotation devices” or “PFDs,” life jackets are considered uncomfortable, hot and nerdy by many boaters. But like other unpopular transportation safety devices - seat belts in cars and helmets for motorcycle riders - they save lives.

According to the Coast Guard, more than 800 people died in boating accidents in 1995, the most recent year for which nationwide statistics are available.

The victims included 629 people who drowned, 561 of whom were not wearing life jackets. While no one can say how many of those people might have been saved, “the best way to minimize the number of deaths due to drowning is to maximize the number of boaters wearing life jackets,” the Coast Guard concluded in a recent report.

In Idaho and Washington, only 15 of the 50 boaters who died last year wore life jackets.

“I’ve never seen us recover (the body of) a drowning victim who was wearing a life jacket,” said Deputy Kevin Mumford of the Kootenai County Sheriff’s Department’s marine unit.

Mumford suspects two duck hunters might have survived a dunking in Kootenai County’s Cave Lake last fall if they’d been wearing life jackets.

For the second year in a row, the Idaho House of Representatives in March killed a bill requiring life jackets on boaters younger than 12. North Idaho representatives were split on the proposal.

Rep. Patrick Bieter, D-Boise, said he co-sponsored the bill at the request of a constituent whose grandchild drowned.

At first, the bill would have required all boaters to wear life jackets.

“We were told, ‘This thing’s dead on arrival,”’ so the bill was toned down, said Bieter, who’s confident the law affecting only children eventually will pass.

“It’s just ludicrous that we have a law requiring the doggone things to be in the boat but not to be worn,” he said.

Idaho law requires people riding personal watercraft or skiing to have life jackets “readily available.” Practically speaking, that means they must be worn, said Mumford. Washington law is less ambiguous, requiring those on skis or personal watercraft to wear life jackets.

Six Washington counties, including Spokane, Pend Oreille and Stevens, have laws requiring children to wear life jackets. Spokane County also requires life jackets for all ages of people boating on the Spokane River and other moving water.

But Washington legislators the past four years have rejected bills requiring the use of life jackets statewide for anyone younger than 10 while riding on boats 18 feet or shorter.

Such a law might have saved Daniel Magana, 8, of Sunnyside, who drowned in the Columbia River in May while fishing with his grandfather. But the law would only work if it were followed, noted Rep. Cathy McMorris, R-Colville.

“By simply passing a law, would that have guaranteed that (Magana) had a life jacket on?” she said, adding that it’s up to parents, not the state, to keep their children safe in boats.

McMorris and other lawmakers who oppose the life-jacket laws for children are in the minority. This year and last, separate but identical bills passed with overwhelming support in each chamber of the legislature. A long list of sheriffs, doctors and safety advocates supported the bills during during committee hearings. A single boater testified against the bills, calling them “nannyism.”

Supporters of the proposed law said lawmakers who oppose the bills succeeded in preventing a House vote on the Senate version and vise-versa.

“Up to the very last day (of the legislative session) we were told, the bill is going to pass,” said Elizabeth Bennett, lead health educator at Children’s Hospital and Regional Medical Center in Seattle. “And then to turn around and have a drowning occur, it just makes me heart-sick.”

Politicians aren’t the only ones who oppose laws requiring the use of life jackets.

In a report in the Federal Register last year, the Coast Guard asked boaters to answer 17 questions regarding safety issues.

Most of the 525 respondents ignored all of the questions but one, asking whether the use of life jackets should be mandatory. Most letter-writers objected strenuously, said Carlton Perry from the Coast Guard office of boater safety in Washington, D.C.

Perry notes that the Coast Guard has authority to enact such laws without congressional approval. But arriving at a decision to do so would be a “long and tedious process,” involving many public hearings and comment periods.