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Message: <blockquote data-quote="C_Hallbert" data-source="post: 3135695" data-attributes="member: 42957">In 1966, I was on a Fishing Peer on the Bay Side of Jones Beach in New York. At around 2:00 am there was a huge, loud, fiery explosion over a mile out in the Great South Bay. It was too far to swim out to try to help. The Coast Guard responded from the West End Coast Guard Station in less than fifteen minutes. I could barely see the streams of water that they sprayed on the fire. However, the size and intensity of the blast probably left no survivors unless they were lucky enough to blown over the side. I recalled a demonstration by a Coast Guard Power Squadron Instructor when I took a Basic Seamanship and Small Boat Handling Course that I took when I was fifteen. He placed two drops of gasoline with an eye dropper into a cannon-like tube that had a spark plug at the bottom and waited 15 seconds. When he fired the spark plug, the sound was deafening. He then asked us to imagine a leak down in the bilge, or in the inboard engine bay with just a small spark after quarts or gallons of gasoline that had time to evaporate. I saw what could happen that night from the peer. The lesson was: #1 ALWAYS Open the Engine Compartment and Inspect for Possible Fuel Leaks Before Starting. #2 ALWAYS Turn On Power Ventilation Fan to clear fumes from the Bilge and Engine Compartments for a few minutes before Starting an Inboard or Inboard/Outboard Engine! Note- That Coast Guard Small Boat Handling Course has provided me discounted Boat Insurance ever since I was fifteen (I’m 71, now). It covered Power Boats below 66 Feet Length, Nautical Terminology, Required Safety Equipment, Marine Knots, Safe Anchoring Procedures, Aides to Navigation, Inland Waterways, Interpretation of Marine Charts, Basic Navigation (Compass Bearing vs True Heading-Coarse-Speed-Distance-Fuel Calculations-Current Vectors), Use of Sextant (Solar or Astrological Fixes and Navigational Tables, Marine Weather and Flag Warnings, Marine Radio Protocols and much more. I greatly appreciate the opportunity to have taken this course and recommend that everyone who sets out on the Lakes, Rivers, Inland Waterways, Bays, Inlets, Gulf or the Oceans should take it not only for themselves but for those they love, care about or assume responsibility for when they take them out on the water. There was a Written Test at the end and I recall that not everyone passed it. I did and it amazes me how much I still remember, but then I’ve been boating all of my life. Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk</blockquote>

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