Triumph Sinks?

[NJWardy]

See the below link. It seems a 150 Triumph was fishing out front in Ocean City, MD and ran into some trouble. I was hoping to hear some follow-up. Did this happen to anyone from TBON?

http://www.thebassbarn.com/forum/showthread.php?t=118707

 

[Jan from Humboldt]

A couple of issues here if I may

If the article was correct it was swamped while at anchor in what were estimated to be 5' waves.

Five footers and even 9-10 waves are doable in a 150 if you are forced to be in it but not at anchor. Things can go wrong in three foot waves while at anchor if you are not careful and anchoring in five footers is just asking for trouble.

The post further said "2 guys and tons of gear" and that they were flipped by one wave, bad stuff and I hate to see it happen to anyone in any boat.

Point being here that any boat can be flipped under the right conditions and therein is Triumph's weak spot in their "Indestructible" advertising campaign as IMHO it could lead a rookie captain to loose his or her fear of the water. And, no pun intended, get in over their heads while out on the water.

I've been in, on and under the water for almost 50 years and I have a deep seated respect for the ocean bordering on outright fear and the reason I know that a 150 will take 9-10 foot seas is I was out in it when it blew up like that. And I was doing A. my level best to a stay upright, B trying to the best of my seaman's abilities to get back across the bar where it was calm and safe as I was about to ruin a good set of underwear.

I didn't and will not go out in it intentionally and the forecast didn't indicate it was going to snot up like that but it sure did.

A couple of years ago we had some folks out in a 195CC up here crabbing, 4 people in the boat and it was a fairly calm day but they got in a bit too close to the surf line and a sneaker wave got them. The swells that day were 4-6' and winds were 8-10, surf was 5-8' and along came a twenty footer. The skipper had just enough time to put it bow on to the wave before they were flipped completely end over end and the end result was that two people died.

The Coast Guard board of inquiry stated operator error combined with a rogue wave as the cause.

Bottom line for all Triumph owners to remember is that Triumph boats are tough and will take a lot but they in reality are not indestructable any more than you are, fact is the boat will probably take more than you can.

Like the avation safety saying goes...

There are old boaters and there are bold boaters but there are no old bold boaters.

Stay chicken out there and stay alive.

And for the record I still love my Triumph and still consider it the best small boat I've ever owned.