Lake Worth Riverboat Sinks

[Hogleg 44]

The Lake Worth "Princess Elizabeth" is now resting comfortably on the bottom of the lake!
She was floating just fine last eve, so the newspaper reports. But when I happened by on the Rt 199 Bridge this morning, this is what I saw!!!
What the guys in the little boats are doing is trying to contain any possible fuel spill.

[CaptainTom]

Wow Paul, great capture.

As an aside, I had the distinct displeasure of Captaining this vessal for several trips on Lake Worth last year. I won't list the safety features it was lacking.
After unsuccessfully trying to get the owners to upgrade several items, I quit.

I am glad that if it had to go down, it went down at the dock.
This sort of incident is usually caused by a thru hull fitting dislodging or rusting out. The owners probably have no idea..

[kyeoman]

Hey, the top deck is still usable and now people don't have to worry about it sinking underneath them! It already has!!

[Ahh!]

Was that your last command?

[Hogleg 44]

Originally Posted by CaptainTom

The owners probably have no idea..

Ill bet they do by now Tom. The report says they were running around in Florida!!!

[CaptainTom]

My last command ? I think it was. At least the last time I got paid to pilot a vessal.

When I was there the owners were two sisters from Arlington. One is a police officer, and the other is an attorney. Since it is an inland lake, the Coast Guard has no jurisdiction. The shores of Lake Worth are actually under the jurisdiction of Fort Worth. A jurisdictional mess at best. As far as I know, the only licensure needed was to sell liguor. I think they hired me to Captain the boat so it would look good to their insurance company.

If a vessal of this size were under Coast Guard jurisdiction, they would likely make them haul it out of the water before it sank and hurt somebody. There is no way it would ever be certified to carry passengers.