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Boating Licenses: What state uses them & what state doesn't?
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Boating Licenses: What state uses them & what state doesn't?
I live in CT and here we have to have a boating license for a boat that uses a motor. Now I have heard both sides of the story where as in CT if you get caught drinking and driving a boat you loose both your boating and your driving license and you are treated as if you were DWI with a car. I have also heard that if you get busted for DWI with a boat you only loose your boating license. Which one is it?
Now back to the different states. Do all states make people get a boating license for boats that use power? If I have a CT license can I use a boat in any state and be legal (does it transfer as a car license does)?
"May your poles be bent and your lines stay tight!!!"
Grady White
208 Adventure (sold)
Now Looking Again
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Boating Licenses: What state uses them & what state doesn't?
You don't need one in MA - And I don't need one anywhere if I'm registered in MA. In MA- you can drink and operate a boat. The limit is .08. If the CG suspects that you are over .08 they can test you. If you are found drunk, the state gets involved and you go to court and the judge decides what to do.
In many states the conviction will go on your driving record and affect your boat and auto insurance.
[This message was edited by aquasport17 on 10-06-03 at 10:56 AM.]
Boating Licenses: What state uses them & what state doesn't?
I think it is absolutely crazy that you don't need a license to drive a boat with a motor. I don't have one in the USA. (Ya, maybe I am a hypocrite...or just lazy) But it is nuts that any yahoo can plop down six or seven figures on a boat and drive it through a harbor with other six or seven figure vessels in it.
I'd vote for a requirement for a license. BTW, in Europe, the way they did it, was by "grandfathering in" anyone who could show proof of ownership of a boat for more than 5 years (I think it was 5 years...). Everyone else had to take a class and pass a course.
Boating Licenses: What state uses them & what state doesn't?
In Massachusetts, you do need a boating safety certificate to operate a motor vessel but only between ages 12 and 15 and must successfully complete a NASBLA-approved boating course. Home study is not accepted for this age group. No one under the age of 12 may operate. If you are 16 or older, the state probably figures you can legally drive a moped and other automobiles and therefore you should be able to operate a boat. Additionally, those six and seven figure boats all have insurance for sure; and if you aren't absent-minded you should have insurance regardless of the number of digits in the price tag on your boat.
I for one would rather see some people behind the wheel of a boat than the same idiot behind the wheel of a car- last week, a 25 year old tried to pass me at 90 so he could get onto an off ramp before me- i slammed on my brakes (thank god i had time to react and wasn't hit during the cut-off) and he ended up in the woods (with a trashed 2000 or so VW turbo jetta). In my opinion idiots in cars are more dangerous to you or I than the same idiot in a boat where they sooner endanger themselves... survival of the fittest.
Its a $420. fine. Maybe a judge could interpret it as operating a motor vehicle and thus take away your driver's license for 90 days (administrative suspension) due to the "per se" law. However that would depend on what type of law enforcement officer stopped you and whether or not you took a bolld alcohol test and of course - what the results were. I'll check at work Tuesday and get back about the losing your driver's license thing...
An operator found guilty of wreckleess boating (endangering life or property) can be "fined and/or imprisoned.
Boating Licenses: What state uses them & what state doesn't?
All you need in Texas is a pluse and on the bay's during summer it show's .........John
Also under a certian age you are required a safty course but these are the one's that are boating safely... It's the I bought it I'm going to run this shore line because I can buttfaces thet get everbody Pee'ed
Boating Licenses: What state uses them & what state doesn't?
In LA to operate a power boat, you are required to have completed a Boating Safety Course if you were born after 1988. No other requirements for persons born before that year though. Like others here, it shows on summer weekend afternoons.
Boating Licenses: What state uses them & what state doesn't?
New Jersey requires an endoresment on your automotive driver's license to operate a boat on N.J. lakes. I don't think there is enough of "policing" when it comes to DWI on the waters in and around New Jersey. A boat can be as dangerous or more dangerous that a car in terms of DWI. I don't believe that the operator of a boat should be drinking. He / she is the "captain of the craft" and they need to have complete control of both themselves and their craft. I have see boat operators that were too drunk to pull their boat into a slip or along a fuel dock. I have a problem with this type of behavior! ----Just my opinion. ------Greg
Boating Licenses: What state uses them & what state doesn't? 
