[Paddlewise] Fatality Rate for Canoeists and Kayakers

Jim Elbrecht did a little research on how fatality rates for paddlers are
computed.  Posted on rec.boats.paddle, and reposted here, with his permission.

Jim got boosted to do this because there is a perception that canoeists and
kayakers have "the highest fatality rate" among boaters.  See below for the
source of the statement and his argument that it is based on a flawed analysis.
I believe this discussion is alive and well on r.b.p., and will continue there
for those interested in the original post.

--
Dave Kruger
Astoria, OR
--

--From: "Jim Elbrecht" <Elbrecht_at_email.com>
Newsgroups: rec.boats.paddle
Sent: Thursday, September 12, 2002 5:18 PM
Subject: Fatality rate

> The post on 'The Dreaded Debate' by Kait who has been contracted by
> the Coast Guard contained a statement that has been asked about &
> commented on several times;
> "After all, canoes and kayaks have the
> highest fatality rate of all boats types- double the rate of personal
> watercraft [and] four times higher than open motorboats."
>
> I've looked around for some hard figures and haven't seen them yet.
> [in that thread Kait gives her source as the testimony at
> http://www.boatus.com/gov/safety_test.htm  ]
>
> The Coast Guard has accident statistics at
> http://www.uscgboating.org/statistics/accident_stats.htm -- but there
> is an obvious lack of comparing "fatality rate" between different
> types of watercraft.
>
> While they repeat the caveat each year, the 1998 file seems to say it best :
> "Historically, one indicator of safety in recreational boating is the
> fatality rate, e.g., the number of reported fatalities as compared to
> the number of numbered recreational boats.. . . .
> While a comparison between the 815 fatalities and the 12,565,930
> numbered boats in 1998 . . . allows one to estimate a national boating
> fatality rate, there are some serious limitations to this
> methodology.   One is that fatality rate comparisons between States
> are invalid because of differences in the scope of each State's boat
> numbering system. Another limitation is that fatalities occur on boats
> which are not numbered, and therefore not included in the boat
> numbering statistics. . . . ."
>
> Note the CG numbers are just including *numbered* (registered) boats.
> They don't even consider taking the number of hours spent on the water
> into consideration.
>
> Looking over the table on p24 of the 1998 report we see that these
> were the only states that require registration of canoes/kayaks
> without motors in 1998;
> AZ, Wash DC, IL, IA, MI [over 16'],  NE, NV, OH, OK, PA, SC, SD [over
> 12']
>
> I thought these numbers from a 2000 Florida paper were interesting.
> They give the overall boating fatality rate in FL over the past decade
> or so as roughly 5-10 deaths per 100,000 *registered* boaters per
> year.
> www.floridaconservation.org/law/boating/2000stats/2000RecBoatFatality.pdf
> [that line wrapped, so be sure to get both sections to go directly to
> the .pdf file]
>
> For the year 2000 they broke down the deaths by type of watercraft.
> [p16]    In the 43 accidents involving 51 vessels in  2000 the boats
> involved broke down as:
>
> Open motorboat - 26
> PWC- 11
> Cabin motorboat- 3
> Rowboat 3
> Airboat 3
> Canoe/Kayak 3
> Sail 1
> No entry 1
>
> [it doesn't say if any/all of the 3 canoe/kayaks were struck by one of
> the 26 motorboats]
>
> Oregon, where I would guess there is a pretty healthy canoe/kayak
> population,  has some numbers at;
> http://www.marinebd.osmb.state.or.us/Safety/Accidents.html
>
> They show the fatality rate throughout the US to be in the 5-10 per
> 100,000 range.   They also list 11 Oregon fatalities for 2002-
> involving 3 drift boats, 6 motor boats, and 2 rafts.
>
> There is also an interesting note there "These statistics do not
> reflect three fatalities involving people on guided fishing trips.
> These are considered "commercial" activities. "
>
> 2001 was a worse year for the Canoe/kayak crowd in Oregon;
> 14 deaths in 2001;
> 5 motor boats
> 4 canoe/kayak
> 3 rafts
> 1 drift boat
> 1 sail
>
> 2000 - 14 fatalities
> 9 motor
> 2 raft
> 2 canoe
> 1 sail
>
> And so it goes. . .    Motor boats are *by far* the biggest killers.
> The question seems to be "how many are there compared to
> canoe/kayaks?" & how many hours are people in them.     In the waters
> I've boated [mostly inland lakes and flat rivers, canoes/kayaks
> outnumber the motor boats, though as someone pointed out, without
> registration I doubt most states have a handle on how many
> canoes/kayaks there are on their waters.
>
> [just when I was beginning to think that Oregon was counting PWCs as
> motorboats, someone was killed in a PWC accident in 1998 -  1 out of
> 51 in 4 years]
>
> There is a Power point presentation at
> http://www.pwcwatch.org/NASBLA_2000_Brief.ppt   which calculates by
> 'hours in the water' based on a 1998 "National Recreational Boating
> Survey" [?] ---   in this study canoes/kayaks lead the pack with one
> death per .42 million hours on the water.
>
> The survey was commissioned by the Coast Guard, but I don't see a copy
> of it or the methodology at their site.
>
> There is a summary of the survey [by our friends at Boat/US] at
> http://www.apg.army.mil/SIBO/safexp1.htm .
>
>
> This seems to be where the 'canoe/kayaks are so cussed dangerous'
> comes from.  I'd like to see their methodology before I take their
> numbers as gospel.
>
> If someone runs across an online copy before me, please post the URL.
>
> Jim
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