Pontoon Boat & Deck Boat Forum

Had a microburst hit the lake last night, they said 80 mph winds.

My slip is about 3\4s of the way down this dock on the side with the roof ripped off of it. From what I can tell, it's still sitting on the hoist and the cover is still on it, but the bimini topped is ripped loose for sure. Lots of other boats hurt a lot worse.

Not sure when we'll be able to get on the docks to survey the damage as all of the ramps are in the water and obviously it's not safe right now.




If you look real close in this picture, about 3\4s of the way down you can see my black Merc hanging off of a boat with the blue playpen cover still on the boat.





Anyone know a good aluminum welder...?

that sucks good luck let us know how you faired when you get closer good luck sir

One good thing about pontoon boats is they are pretty hard to sink. That guy with the monohull cruiser with the bow in the air is in a whole lot more trouble. His engine may have gone under.

I imagine you will be wearing some battle scars but I bet you are OK.
I think it gives a boat some character and certainly something to talk about when you are rafted up on the lake.
Are they going to crane that broken pan roof off or just take it out in pieces? That may make a lot of difference in further damages during the repair.

A South Florida guy would say "You boys need a wind code"

Looking at the pictures again it looks like it picked up the floating dock and dropped it on the boats after they were blown under it. Again, if you can do it, that crane might be the best way to pick this mess apart. Lift the dock and pull out all the boats that will come.
I had a mango tree land on my screen cage during Charlie and had the same decision to make. A big crane saved me a lot of grief and trouble.
Is there a barge crane on your lake?

It looks like what happened is the wind started ripping the roof sheets off and then the whole roof structure broke loose and laid over to the North. It's all just one dock there with slips on each side of it. When the roof tilted over it raised up some of the walkways between the slips. Thats what tilted some of the hoists and dumped their boats on end.

Where my boat is, the walkways appeared to have stayed flat...although the pontoon two slips further out than mine has slid off of the front of it's hoist and is standing on it's nose.

I still haven't heard from the marina as to what their plans are. Someone said they are going to arrange shuttle boats later today or possibly tomorrow to run people out to the dock to check on their boats. I'm going to try to find someone to run me out to mine.

I could probably let mine off of the lift and bring it in, but there is no power to raise my lift back up again...and I don't want it to end up on the bottom of the lake.

A good thing about that light weight pan roof structure is it doesn't hurt much when it comes down. Hopefully you will come away with a few small scratches and no serious damage. Just be careful extricating the boat so you don't make things worse or hurt yourself.
I don't know much about that kind of lift. Is it floating? We have piling lifts here.

Yeah, it's a floating lift attached to the dock. You let air out to drop it and blow air back in to it to lift it back again.

I just secured a ride up on a boat to get a close look at it. Going up after the football game.

This picture from the news shows the roof structure bent over a bit better...





My slip is 12 down on the right hand side.

Obviously a bit late on this, but . . .

My guess is that the marina may want to move out those boats that can be moved out. It makes the roof and upright removal a lot easier. As far as your lift - can you not get a set of chains? Run one set forward and one set aft under the lift. Lower the lift just enough to remove the boat and then secure the lift with the chains secured to the walkway.

Unless your lift is not all that well secured to the dock, I can't think of a reason why it would sink to the bottom.

http://smg.photobucket.com/albums/v362/ ... 1127-1.jpg <http://smg.photobucket.com/albums/v362/ ... 1127-1.jpg>


Had a microbrust blow through last night about midnight. They think 80 mph straight line winds did the damage.

The closeups of our boat start about picture 19 or so. Tan pontoon boat with a blue cover on it. It doesn't look too bad considering all of the others on that side of the dock. Bimini top, possibly the frame for the top...little bit of damage to the hoist and the boat is sitting a bit sideways on the hoist. I'm sure the cover took some damage too but at least it stayed on.

It looks like the wind got under the roof and picked up our whole side of the dock or at least a large part of it..then the roof let go and it all crashed back down. The dock is totaled.

Sure screwed up our fall boating plans, but it could have been a lot worse.

DAMN LANCE!!1
40 MILES away and we got nothin....

Looks like you got lucky! Well kinda...

Keep us posted.

Hell, my house is only about 3 miles away and there weren't even any twigs blown down here...

welcome to tropical weather!
It is really pretty coll stuff when you study it.
It is simply the crash of different temperature air.
The water does that to us every afternoon in the summer but you folks see it now and then too.

The good news is if you can read clouds, it will never take you by surprise but it can go faster than you.

Damn... hopefully insurance will take care of your damage.

WOW I didn't realize the storms up north were that bad! Any way we could get a few more pictures of the damaged boats?