On Saturday, a man jumped off a Hoofer boat and disappeared. Did he actually drown..? (read the breaking news story here.)
Or is it perhaps a faked death, like in the movies where someone just wants to disappear..?
Stay tuned.
June 18 UPDATE: There have been some good comments, but on principal, we don't like to modify posts or edit their content once they're made. The bit about someone perhaps wanting to disappear was not intended to diminish the seriousness of a drowning.
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Might be a good idea to delete the second half insensitive part of this post...
ReplyDeleteThank you. I knew the victim and am heartbroken. I am also the daughter of a Coastie and long time boater. Horrified that a 'Fleet Commander' would say this.
DeleteI hope the good Hoofers will watch the case of this as it develops. UW Risk Management has before denied indemnity to sailboat operators, falsely claiming the Club is only open certain hours and the like. Nonsense. They will do what they will to protect UW from paying a wrongful death judgment. Risk Management, the Wisconsin Union Director and Staff, and University Counsel over the past 15 years at least have been well-aware of the conflicts of interest at the Club and its deleterious effect on maintaining safe equipment and rational operating policies. Unfortunately, the alcoholic culture at the Club has not been taken seriously, nor the financial conflicts of interest in it the UW maintains. No doubt, a plaintiff's lawyer will be looking at all of this now. On the other hand, it could be an accident, which the Dane County Circuit Court might ultimately rule in a lawsuit; but I hope everybody who was on that sailboat, and perhaps the employees and policy makers at the Club are wise enough to consult a lawyer. Don't trust UW not to take advantage of your citizen ignorance of the law.
ReplyDeleteFor some reason, the characteristics of high-functioning alcoholics comes to mind in connection with the Hoofer Sailing Club. As a whole, the club certainly does "obsess about the next drinking opportunity" and "repeat unwanted drinking patterns and behavior."
ReplyDeleteBut maybe it's not so high-functioning anymore, since the club doesn't "appear to the outside world to be managing life well" with craptacular piers, dwindling numbers of working boats and declining member participation. And we can no longer say that the club has "experience(d) few tangible losses and consequences from their drinking, often by sheer luck."
Its luck ran out. Is there AA for organizations?
Agreed. Anyone who knows anything about sailors knows that alcohol is a major part of the lifestyle.
DeleteFleet commander: the victim was a beloved man whose death was all too real. How dare you?! You are the worst to represent the sailing community. How could you post a joke about this??? UW: you had better come out with the truth.
ReplyDeleteAlthough the main post is insensitive at best, the comments raise some valid points. This is a tragic event but not unique to Hoofers. PFDs save lives when they are available and worn. I hope that the investigation reveals that there was a PFD for each person on the boat. Not sure what the UW/Hoofer policy is on alcohol on boats, but hope that alcohol was not a contributing factor to this tragedy.
ReplyDeleteI also feel for the skipper and crew of the boat. They will have to live with this (as well as the man's family) for the rest of their lives.
Boy, I'm sure glad the Union stepped in to require everyone to wear life jackets all the time. Maybe if there were adults in the club, I could see not having such a rule, but you can't let people make their own decisions, because God forbid they might learn something, and where would we be if learning started taking place at Universities? I just hope the enforcement of this rule is as effective as the alcohol ban has been.
ReplyDeleteFleet Commander, please don't go down this road. Whatever issues you have with the club, whatever it has done to you and/or your associates, please remember that there are other people that matter, too, and don't make it all about you and your anger. Captain Ahab had his white whale, which proved the undoing of not only himself, but most of those around him. You're hurting others with this line of attack.
ReplyDeleteHamood was a son, a brother, a friend to many people; a real person with a life and dreams of his own. Please don't use him as just another rock to lob at the sailing club. Remember that when we criticize the Hoofer Sailing Club for its insider politics, its conflicts of interest, its lax safety practices, its dilution of ratings standards for its sailors and its raging alcohol problems, there's a purpose behind the criticism, and it's not simply payback for personal wrongs. We criticize the club because we want it to be better. We want to make it safe and fun for all its members. We want to ensure that nobody gets hurts, the boats remain in good condition, and--heaven forfend--nobody dies.
But now somebody has, and a lot of us feel in some way that we failed Hamood. Perhaps we could have pushed harder for policy changes, perhaps we could have spoken up more and louder, perhaps we should have reported more incidents, perhaps we should have called UWPD a few times for the egregious behavior... then maybe this wouldn't have happened, and he'd still be alive. The commodore is one of the people who's really torn up about this tragedy, thinking maybe he should have done more. He wants to make the changes so we reduce the chance that this never happens again. (The possibility can never be completely eliminated, of course, and it could very well be that nothing could have prevented this incident.)
So, Fleet Commander, you could use this incident as ammo to take a few pot-shots at the club to further a vendetta, but I would ask you to please respect the victim as a person. Use this as an opportunity to provide thoughtful, respectful commentary. Or, even better, take this opportunity to support the commodore to make the club a better place, and safer for everybody.
(P.S. Anonymous-- The new life jacket policy comes from the commodore, not the Union.)
My point stands that treating adults like children who are incapable of assessing risks and making their own decisions is not a valid solution to any problem. An adult made a decision and died because of it. That doesn't change anything. There don't need to be new rules now. The risk involved with sailing didn't somehow increase since a week ago. If the commodore or the union leadership or Hahn or anyone else want to make things safer, they should start enforcing the rules we've had in place for decades and offer some sort of water-based first-aid/lifesaving courses.
ReplyDeleteWe're not children. We can decide when to put a lifejacket on. If someone dies because they made the wrong decision, that has nothing to do with anyone else.
Is the skipper of the boat or crew facing any blowback? Also, the early stories that came-out had people swimming in the water and then the man jumped in/man jumped in with no one else swimming. I guess with a tragedy such as this, a post mortem/root cause analysis on what did happen that fateful day would inform future actions.
ReplyDeleteThe Club has had an extremely good safety record that I imagine surpasses any other club of its size. By learning from what actually happened, it will help us become even safer.
By "extremely good safety record," did you perhaps actually mean, "extremely short institutional memory"? Anybody's record can be extremely clean when it's regularly scrubbed.
ReplyDelete