Today’s Doofus is from Virginia.
A 35-year-old mother died after her 7-year-old son accidentally crashed their powerboat into a pier on the Hampton River Sunday evening, according to police.
Virginia Marine Police Spokesman Don Bull said an adult allowed the child to briefly steer the boat as the family was returning home from a day on the water. The child veered the boat into and underneath the pier at about 6:15 p.m.
His mother, Elizabeth J. Elliott of Hampton, was sitting on the bow of the boat and took the brunt of the impact, sending her crashing through the boat’s glass windshield and into the back of the boat, according to John Bull, Director of Public Relations for the Marine Resources Commission of Virginia.
Stephano Leonardi and his family were enjoying the holiday in their backyard overlooking the river when they heard the crash and saw the boat start spinning in circles.
“My father, he jumped on the jet ski to go immediately straight over there with some line to try to pull it in,” said Leonardi. “A friend of mine actually went and ran and jumped in the water to swim immediately over there.”
Leonardi said they pulled the boat and its stunned passengers back to their pier. He said the 7-year-old boy who had been steering the boat was screaming and his grandmother, Elliott’s mother, was frantic.
“He was just like, ‘Help! Help!’ and the older lady, I believe it was her daughter, she was screaming, ‘Help! Help!'”
Leonardi scooped the boy up in his arms. “I picked him up and grabbed him and we had to get him to land and I told some of the older women to take care of him and get him away,” he said.
Back on the boat, the boy’s mother was bleeding terribly. “You had people jump in there to check vital signs, I mean she was really bad off,” said Leonardi.
. . .
Bull added that Virginia does not have any laws regarding age restrictions for people operating motorboats, even though there is a law that requires anyone operating a personal watercraft to be at least 16 years old, or 14 if they have completed a personal watercraft course.
There’s more at the link.
Whoever put a seven-year-old child at the helm of a powerful speedboat like that should be tried for culpable homicide, in my opinion. Such a craft is just as fast as the average family car. The likely consequences of putting a child behind the wheel of that car aren’t exactly hard to imagine; so why the hell would allowing them to steer a boat of similar performance result in anything different?
Now the poor kid has to live with the knowledge that he killed his own mother . . . when, in reality, the person responsible for her death is whoever allowed him to steer in the first place. If that was his mother, she was asking for trouble, and got it – to her son’s eternal detriment. If it was someone else, I hope they don’t get much sleep at night for the next few years, thinking about what they’ve done.
Peter
That is just a sad situation… I feel for that family and the young boy,and your comment was dead on.
If the boat had a throttle stop at a little more than steerage and they were out in the open away from traffic, and given close supervision, I think it is reasonable for a child to sit with a parent and turn the wheel this way and that.
As for this mess, it is beyond senseless.