Article: Pedal to the metal: running at high speed can be a thrill or a nightmare, depending on how you respond to changes in conditions. (Seamanship).

While motoring up Connecticut's Thames River a couple of years ago, and paying attention to the buoys along the way, I spotted a brand-new 45-foot performance boat perched atop a rock jetty that was nearly submerged at low tide. Talk on the dock was that the boat's skipper had swerved sharply to avoid a "strange object" that turned out to be one of the innocent nun buoys I was tracking on my chart. For the 15 years that this poor guy had run the river, that buoy had been in the same place--with one crucial difference. His previous trips had been made at speeds considerably under the 75-mph rate he was reportedly running at the time of the accident.

This incident ...

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