Auxiliarists'

A VOLUNTEER, nonmilitary organization, the Coast Guard Auxiliary was established by Congress to promote safety in recreational boating in the United States. Its 22,170 members, both men and women, are experienced boatmen, amateur radio operators, or licensed aircraft pilots. boats must be equipped and maintained to high standards of safety which far exceed the requirements of Federal law for recreational motorboats. In the operation of their craft Auxiliarists take pride in the fact that they are known for the promotion of safe boating by setting a good example.

To accomplish its purpose the Auxiliary carries out three basic programs: The Courtesy Motorboat Examination, Public Education, and Operations.

Courtesy Motorboat Examination. Specially trained and qualified members of the Auxiliary are authorized to conduct a courtesy examination of motorboats when requested by the owner or operator. This is a thorough safety check of the boat's equipment and general condition, covering both the requirements of the Federal law and certain additional standards for safety which have been adopted by the Auxiliary. Boats meeting these standards are awarded the respected Auxiliary C.M.E. decal. (Official Coast Guard boarding teams and most State officials will normally refrain from boarding a boat which displays a current decal.) If a boat does not pass the examination, the owner is advised of the deficiencies noted.

Public Education. The Auxiliary offers three separate courses in boating safety to the public: The onelesson Outboard Handling course, the three-lesson Safe Boating course, and the eight-lesson Basic Seamanship course. The most complete course offered by the Auxiliary (Basic Seamanship) covers aids to navigation, rules of the road, marlinspike seamanship, motorboat handling, boating laws, charts and compass, and safe boating practices.

Operations. To assist the US. Coast Guard, members of the Auxiliary patrol regattas and marine parades and perform assistance missions for those in distress. These Auxiliary operations are often performed in conjunction with regular Coast Guard units.

Ellsworth A. Weinberg
National Commodore
U.S. Coast Guard Auxiliary

areas Auxiliarists set up examination stations, manning them throughout the course of the week. The onelesson boating course also becomes a particularly useful boating safety tool at this time.

In the spring special Safe Boating Week kits are distributed to hundreds of local civic groups throughout the Nation. The posters, TV and radio spots, and other promotional materials contained in the kits help these safety-minded people toward a successful community observance.

Many national organizations cooperate each year on the National

Safe Boating Week Committee. Coast Guard Auxiliary achievement during calendar year 1965:

185, 674

Nonmembers instructed in safe boating courses---- 163,552 Motorboats examined (courtesy examinations plus facility inspections___ Nonmembers shown safe boating films___ Cases of assistance rendered_ Regattas patrolled_. Lives saved____.

656,962 6, 877 3,668 113

WHAT ARE COAST GUARD law enforcement teams doing on the inland waters of the United States?

By congressional direction the Coast Guard operates on "navigable waters of the United States," which come under Federal jurisdiction. And on these inland Federal waters, the Coast Guard has a responsibility which is shared by the States. Our purpose in visiting inland waters is to sample the boating situation, and to demonstrate to the States and local authorities what they can do with a minimum of equipment. We do not provide law enforcement or search and rescue services to one given area

tachments are our specialists in motorboat law enforcement. They are the backbone of our boating safety program. But it must not be forgotten that our cutters, large and small, also participate in safety patrols. And in the specialized field of marine parades and regattas our ancillary organization of volunteer boatmen, the Coast Guard Auxiliary, devotes many hours in providing safety patrols.

Our best estimate is that there are about 175,000 more boats each year. This puts afloat approximately onehalf million more boaters each year. Considering the replacement of those

You can see that the Coast Guard stepped up its program in pace with the postwar boating boom, but you can see, too, that only recently have our boarding officers been sufficiently well trained to recognize a violation when they see one. Both the institution of the safety patrol concept of more cruising and less boarding accounts for the dip in the curve between 1964 and 1965. There is, naturally, a dip also in the reports of violation, however, not in the same proportion. In fact, our experience shows an increase in the percentage found in violation, and it is very high, as you will soon see.

Although we boarded twice as many boats in 1965 as in 1955, you will see in graph 4 that the number of violations reported jumped more than tenfold. This reflects our experience

or body of water, but rather move about to cover as many places with boating concentrations as possible. To do so, we need a mobility greater than that afforded by waterborne transportation. To fill this need we operate 36 mobile boarding detachments. These are teams of three men, each equipped with a truck, trailer, and boat. Their primary mission is public education. This is carried out through public information programs that they conduct and through the law enforcement medium. Their secondary mission is that of search and rescue, a duty which they perform incidental to their regular duties, but which claims top priority when an incident occurs within their reach. These mobile boarding de

who retire from the boating fraternity, the number of new boaters is large indeed. Graph 1 indicates that the phenomenal growth of boating continues.

Recognizing that something had to be done to cope with this phenomenal boating growth, Congress acted to bring a greater number of boats under Federal regulation through the Federal Boating Act of 1958, which will be recalled replaced the old numbering act of 1918. Graph 2 shows there is little comparison between the control prior to and after that legislation.

The pattern of boardings for motorboat law enforcement purposes through the years, and the pattern of violations reported as a result of those boardings is shown in graph 3.

Graph 2

and training in motorboat law enforcement and the institution of mobile boarding teams.

About the same time that we stepped up our motorboat law enforcement program, we developed through our Auxiliary a program wherein the boat owner voluntarily submits his boat to examination by a qualified member of the Auxiliary, who is also a boat owner. This is a free program with no strings or penalties attached. Steadily through the years it has increased in popularity and pulled along with it an everincreasing number of boats qualified for the coveted Coast Guard Auxiliary decal, a symbol of safety. Graph 5 shows this growth.

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Earlier I mentioned that our safety patrol concept is basically one of boating safety education. An important feature, however, is the deterrent effect that our vessels have in being seen on the waters by the would-be imprudent operator. Not forgotten in our utilization of our mobile boarding teams is the good work they can do in the field of public information and education on the beach. Graph 6 shows the breakdown of our operational deployment as experienced last summer. Our units were on patrol 62 percent of their operational time, enroute between areas of operations roughly 24 percent of the time, and engaged in public information 14 percent of the time.

The exposure of our "seagoing cops" to the recreational boating fleet is shown on graph 7. Some 464,000 vessels were observed; and perhaps, in return, observed us. Out of this number, 11,500 were boarded; representing only 2.7 percent of those encountered. We used to be accused of

NUMBER OF BOATS

200,000

harassment. And there was apparently some basis for that where we laid off the marinas and boarded boats as they were launched. We don't think that claim is generally true any more.

Let's take a closer look in graph 8 at the 2.7 percent that were boarded and see what we found. Fifty-eight percent of those vessels were in violation of Federal regulations. Only the smaller 42 percent passed examination. This is higher than previously experienced and probably stems from two factors: (1) The better training that we have given our boarding officers and (2) the fact that the board

2000

3000 NUMBER OF VIOLATIONS

Graph 4

4000

5000

ing teams are singling out for boarding those vessels which are operating in an apparently unsafe manner.

A further breakdown of the types of violations that compose this large segment of those boarded reveals that the most common cause is lack of or improper numbering and absence of registration certificates which are required to be aboard. The one in five violation of lifesaving devices regulations is alarming to us, because it represents a flagrant disregard for safety. Disturbing also, is the 14 percent in violation of fire extinguisher requirements and 10 percent (continued on page 135)