News f2s wrote:
"Jeff" wrote in message
news
I have trouble following your logic, and where did you get those
numbers???

here's a good source:
http://www.uscgboating.org/statistic...dent_stats.htm


same source, excepting a correction in sailboat numbers for those
states which don't require sailboats and auxiliary sailboats to be
registers. *However* serious finger trouble on my part and lack of
double checking changed 4% into 40%!


-------------------------------------------
Boats (12,000,000 - of which sail and Aux sail 40%)

12 million boats are registered, but only about 140,000 see
below, or 1.2% are auxiliary sail, with slightly over have
being outboards. I don't know how you could think 40% of all
boats are sail!


Agreed. I was looking in 2002 for comparable figures in aviation
and vehicles as well. In 2002 the CG recorded 216,657 auxiliary
sailboats and 123,772 sail boats (340,429 - 2.5% of the total
fleet) with possibly a further 50,000 from states which did not
require registration of these vessels, but required power only
registration. I know - 3%. Good thing you were there to check!

The 2002 numbers are quite quirky. In the several years before, and
several years after, the number of auxiliary sailboats is about
140,000, or 1.2% of the fleet. How 75000 sailboats suddenly appeared
in 2002 and then disappeared in 2003 is beyond me. The only aux
sailboats not registered would be in some states that waive
registration of vessels with engines under 10 hp, and I don't think
many of those are left.

Unpowered sailboats are hardly worth considering because the numbers
are so unreliable. In addition to the problems in counting them, I've
never heard of an accident (other than a fatality) on a small boat
being reported.

And certainly, in a discussion about propeller strikes, including
unpowered vessels isn't fair!


....
The point of my original quotation of rates per 100,000 etc was to
show the following(now corrected!)
-------------------------------------
Cars. (number not known by me)
....
4.5 per 10,000,000 hours
....
2.8 deaths per 10,000,000 boating hours (heroic assumption; 250hrs
per boat pa)

Remember, if your guess of 250 hours is high by a factor of 2, then
boats are more dangerous (by the hour) then cars.