By Bob Currie, Recreational Boating Safety Specialist
U. S. Coast Guard Auxiliary Station Galveston Flotilla
In oceanography, a shoal is a natural submerged ridge, bank, or bar that consists of, or is covered by, sand, shell, or other unconsolidated material such as silt, and rises from the bed of a body of water close to the surface or above it, which poses a danger to navigation. Shoaling is

By Bob Currie, Recreational Boating Safety Specialist
U. S. Coast Guard Auxiliary Station Galveston Flotilla
I received word that there was an unoccupied boat similar to the one in the picture below floating loose in Stingaree Marina. By the time I got to the marina someone had rescued the boat and tied it up in a wet stall. I was able to trace the owner using the TX number on the side

By Bob Currie, Recreational Boating Safety Specialist
U. S. Coast Guard Auxiliary Station Galveston Flotilla
There are valid reasons for not following ships and boats closely. This column will address how to use your judgment to maintain a proper distance between your boat and other vessels in a following situation.
Rules of the Road: Overtaking (Rule 13)

By Bob Currie, Recreational Boating Safety Specialist
U. S. Coast Guard Auxiliary Station Galveston Flotilla
Duck soup is slang for an easily accomplished task or assignment. The term is over 100 years old, but it is still applicable today. For this column it has a double meaning, as this column is aimed towards duck hunters in particular. The assigned task is to come back home

By Bob Currie, Recreational Boating Safety Specialist
U. S. Coast Guard Auxiliary Station Galveston Flotilla
Well, it’s that time of year when we revert from Daylight Savings Time back to Standard Time. Using the old saying, spring ahead and fall back, we turn our clocks back an hour. Fall sneaks up slowly on us here on the Gulf of Mexico; water temperatures begin to get

By Bob Currie, Recreational Boating Safety Specialist
U. S. Coast Guard Auxiliary Station Galveston Flotilla
For many recreational boaters, the first cool spell signals the end of their boating season. Many boaters pull their boat out of the water, park it in the back yard, and cover it with a tarp and let it sit until the next spring. But winterizing your boat and equipment is an important job that

By Bob Currie, Recreational Boating Safety Specialist
U. S. Coast Guard Auxiliary Station Galveston Flotilla
Whenever I perform a Vessel Safety Check on a recreational boat, after I complete the inspection for the required items I then get into the Coast Guard recommendations, including the one on fuel management. Good fuel management allows you to go farther on a tank of gas

By Bob Currie, Recreational Boating Safety Specialist
U. S. Coast Guard Auxiliary Station Galveston Flotilla
The master or person in charge of a vessel is obligated by law to provide assistance that can be safely provided to any individual in danger at sea (46 USC 2304). The type of assistance is greatly dependent on the ability of the assisting vessel’s master to provide assistance

By Bob Currie, Recreational Boating Safety Specialist
U. S. Coast Guard Auxiliary Station Galveston Flotilla
The Texas Outdoor Annual, an official publication of the Texas Parks and Wildlife Division, is my go to reference for anything having to do with fishing, hunting, and boating in Texas. Although I have a hard copy of the Outdoor Annual in my boat, I find the easiest way to

By Bob Currie, Recreational Boating Safety Specialist
U. S. Coast Guard Auxiliary Station Galveston Flotilla
I monitor the Coast Guard rescues and analyze what went wrong in each case as much as I can with the limited information given for each incident. There is a common theme to most of the offshore rescues: the boat is taking on water and has either been swamped or

By Bob Currie, Recreational Boating Safety Specialist
U. S. Coast Guard Auxiliary Station Galveston Flotilla
People see Auxiliarists in uniform performing their duties and know that we are part of the US Coast Guard, but often that is as far as their understanding goes. We are the uniformed civilian component of the US Coast Guard, and we support the Coast Guard in nearly all

By Bob Currie, Recreational Boating Safety Specialist
U. S. Coast Guard Auxiliary Station Galveston Flotilla
Before the 18th-century development of the marine chronometer by John Harrison and the lunar distance method, dead reckoning was the primary method of determining longitude available to mariners such as Christopher Columbus on his

General Assessment of Risk: Your GAR Score
By Bob Currie, Recreational Boating Safety Specialist
U. S. Coast Guard Auxiliary Station Galveston Flotilla
Before we (Coast Guard and Coast Guard Auxiliary) go out on a boat patrol, we perform a process known as a General Assessment of Risk, or GAR. The GAR process was also called the Green-Amber-Red model. Under

By Bob Currie, Vessel Examiner
United States Coast Guard Auxiliary, Flotilla 081-06-08
Visual distress signals (VDS) include day signals that are visible in the daylight hours, night signals that are visible in the dark, and anytime signals that can be used both day and night. VDS may be either pyrotechnic, which use smoke and flame, or non- pyrotechnic, which are

By Bob Currie, Recreational Boating Safety Specialist
U. S. Coast Guard Auxiliary Station Galveston Flotilla
Sometimes I forget that recreational boating is about more than fishing. This article will be about some other water sports and how to both participate in them and to boat in proximity to them. First, let’s look at the top eight accident causes for 2023, the last full year for which we

By Bob Currie, Recreational Boating Safety Specialist
U. S. Coast Guard Auxiliary Station Galveston Flotilla
Do you like to watch reality shows? Discovery has their own show called Naked and Afraid. Apparently it is popular because it has been shown for 17 seasons. The premise is you take a male and female duo and put them in a situation where they have no food, no water,

By Bob Currie, Recreational Boating Safety Specialist
U. S. Coast Guard Auxiliary Station Galveston Flotilla
Obi-Wan: “I felt a great disturbance in the Force…as if millions of voices suddenly cried out in terror, and were suddenly silenced. I fear something terrible has happened.”
Hurricane Beryl Effects
Well, Hurricane Beryl wasn’t a

By Bob Currie, Recreational Boating Safety Specialist
U. S. Coast Guard Auxiliary Station Galveston Flotilla
Well, Hurricane Beryl has left the building, so to speak, but we are still feeling the affects of the Category 1 hurricane. Many people in my area, around one million people, still do not have electricity as I write this. I live on Bolivar Peninsula, which took the brunt of the winds. I ended up

By Bob Currie, Recreational Boating Safety Specialist
U. S. Coast Guard Auxiliary Station Galveston Flotilla
For most people who live on a coast, whenever a large storm is imminent there is one major question to be answered. That question can be found in a song by The Clash, Should I Stay or Should I Go. Sure, it’s a love song, but the main premise can surely be applied to our current

By Bob Currie, Recreational Boating Safety Specialist
U. S. Coast Guard Auxiliary Station Galveston Flotilla
In this article we look at the top 10 known primary contributing factors of recreational boating accidents from 2023, the last full year for which we have data, with 2022 thrown in for comparison. Here are the tables (click on table for larger view):

By Bob Currie, Recreational Boating Safety Specialist
U. S. Coast Guard Auxiliary Station Galveston Flotilla
Although the Pink Floyd song ‘Another Brick in the Wall’ is one of my favorites, and the “We don’t need no education” line in the song is universally known, the 2023 Recreational Boating Accident Statistics show that recreational boaters really do need education. This article

By Bob Currie, Recreational Boating Safety Specialist
U. S. Coast Guard Auxiliary Station Galveston Flotilla
You may be reading this if you are a member of the 2126 Club, whose members were seriously injured in a recreational boating accident in 2023. If you are a member of the 564 Club, then you are not reading this because you are dead. To be a member of the 564 Club one must

By Bob Currie, Recreational Boating Safety Specialist
U. S. Coast Guard Auxiliary Station Galveston Flotilla
If you are a member of the 564 Club, then you are not reading this because you are dead. To be a member of the 564 Club one must have died as the result of a recreational boating accident in 2023. You may be reading this if you are a member of the 2126 Club, whose members were

By Bob Currie, Recreational Boating Safety Specialist
U. S. Coast Guard Auxiliary Station Galveston Flotilla

The Coast Guard has released the Recreational Boating Accident Statistics for 2023. The following tables give you an overview. I ask everyone to look at the tables and ask themselves the following questions:

By Bob Currie, Recreational Boating Safety Specialist
U. S. Coast Guard Auxiliary Station Galveston Flotilla
This Friday, May 24, was the last day of National Safe Boating Week. The Coast Guard used this week to reach as many people as possible in the hopes that they would learn something about safe boating. The National Safe Boating Council recommends these ten safety tips

By Bob Currie, Recreational Boating Safety Specialist
U. S. Coast Guard Auxiliary Station Galveston Flotilla
Here is a scenario that happens all too often all over the US: You are the skipper of a nice recreational boat. You decide to take some friends out for a boat ride. Everything is going well when all of a sudden you hit a wave at a bad angle and you are thrown overboard. If you are doing

By Bob Currie, Recreational Boating Safety Specialist
U. S. Coast Guard Auxiliary Station Galveston Flotilla
Safe Boating Week is from May 18-24, 2024. The purpose of the Safe Boating Campaign is to promote boater education and safe operation so that all boaters get home safely. Getting home safely from a recreational boating outing is simply a matter of following some