We all know what Paul Harvey would say....
Quote:
The boat was a bow-rider. It's a boat in which passengers can ride in the bow, or in front of the windscreen. It was designed to hold 12 people.
The lawsuit says "designing and manufacturing boats which encourage bow-riding has been known by boating manufacturers to be an unsafe practice since at least 1994."
The lawsuit claims the Crownline 225BR (the type of boat involved in the crash) is an "unsafe design for a twelve-passenger boat" and that "the unsafe design...contributed to causing the injuries suffered by the plaintiffs."
The lawsuit states bow-riding is unsafe because it "exposes persons on the bow to the risk of ejection in case of collision, and it places passengers in front of the driver, thereby obstructing the driver's ability to see objects in or on the water ahead of the vessel."
Sullivan told First Coast News, "If you make a boat that has only seven seats behind the windshield in the cockpit, you shouldn't advertise or sell it as a 12-passenger boat because you're going to assume five passengers will ride in the front of the driver, thereby obstructing the driver's view."
Fourteen people, not the recommended twelve, were on the boat when it crashed into a parked push-boat in the Intracoastal Waterway.
The lawsuit says, "However the two additional passengers did not cause or contribute to causing the accident" because those two additional people were behind the driver.
The lawsuit is seeking $75,000 in damages.
When asked if the boat's driver should bear some responsibility, Sullivan told First Coast News, "Nobody is saying the manufacturer is solely at fault. Anytime you have an accident like this, there are many contributing causes. But the driver is deceased, and so the clearest cause of action among these people who contribute to this is the boating manufacturer."
Sullivan added, "And if [the company] bears a part of the responsibility, they need to be responsible for that portion of liability."
Sullivan said other survivors of the boat crash may add their names to this lawsuit.
From the rest of the article quoted in the original post.
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Paul
2007 Four Winns Horizon 220Mercruiser 350 Mag MPI w/ Bravo III Drive
2004 Ford Explorer Limited (V8-AWD)
Pomme de Terre Lake (Southwest Missouri)
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I do hope that some of the passengers decide to sue the boat operator, some justice might be served there.
) Yeah I gonna take them to court so I can be another cause for higher insurance rates, liability issues for ALL power equipment mfg's. I think I'll just be happy that I can walk & do everything as before the accident almost %100 but some W/pain. It was MY FAULT Plain & Simple!! 
