A whale of a time?

[garymalmgren]

Two men found dead inside drifting boat off Queensland coast

A 39-year-old man from Emerald and a 59-year-old man from the Mackay area are found dead inside a twin-hulled power boat thought to have crashed at high speed off Central Queensland.

www.abc.net.au

 

[Will Gilmore]

Speed is deceiving. You're riding smoothly along. Standing up, walking about, no thought to what might happen if you suddenly stopped.
Such a tragedy. My condolences to their families.

-Will (Dragonfly)

 

[Daveinet]

It seems a little odd to have that much damage, that high up. I realize it is a cat, but most boats on plane get their nose out of the water and would clear or skip over anything submerged. Makes me wonder if they saw it ahead of time and chopped the throttle, hoping to minimize impact. Of course off throttle you completely loose steering as well.

 

[rgranger]

Two men found dead inside drifting boat off Queensland coast

A 39-year-old man from Emerald and a 59-year-old man from the Mackay area are found dead inside a twin-hulled power boat thought to have crashed at high speed off Central Queensland.

www.abc.net.au

Story said speed was not excessive ... but it killed them.

 

[Will Gilmore]

It seems a little odd to have that much damage, that high up. I realize it is a cat, but most boats on plane get their nose out of the water and would clear or skip over anything submerged. Makes me wonder if they saw it ahead of time and chopped the throttle, hoping to minimize impact. Of course off throttle you completely loose steering as well.

I agree, the damage does not look consistent with a "submerged" object. There are no other boats reported missing?!?

-Will (Dragonfly)

 

[capta]

I seriously doubt that this is a collision with a whale. However, River monsters are quite common up that way and they could easily do that sort of damage and can be nearly invisible until you are on them.
"River Monster";
Frequently found in Alaskan and PNW rivers, channels and open water but can be found in most areas the world especially after a hard rain. A large floating tree root or any fairly large tree part floating in the water. When hit by a boat they can roll and frequently do much more damage than one would expect.

 

[shemandr]

To stove an aluminum hull like that I would think they hit something very immobile - like a rock. Someone in the article was quoted as saying, "That area is characterised by lots of small, rocky islands and lots of submerged objects". Usually the most simple explanation is the correct one.

 

[capta]

To stove an aluminum hull like that I would think they hit something very immobile - like a rock. Someone in the article was quoted as saying, "That area is characterised by lots of small, rocky islands and lots of submerged objects". Usually the most simple explanation is the correct one.

In my experience, any collision with a rock that could do that much damage to an alloy boat would hole it in at least one place. Alloy will tear as it bends when it hits an immovable object. Here we see a lot of bending but no apparent tears or holes, as if it hit something that gave way as the boat went over it.