Coroner’s boat buying warning after deaths

ANYONE buying a secondhand boat should have it inspected by a qualified person, the coroner who investigated the deaths of four friends who failed to return from a fishing trip in Frederick Henry Bay in 2016 has recommended.

Coroner Simon Cooper released his findings yesterday into the deaths of Luke William Davies, 32, Magnus Julian Ritter, 34, Aleksander Drobnjak, 26, and Anthony James Bernard Roche, 35.

The friends set out from Cremorne on July 31, 2016, in a 4.88m Haines Hunter fibreglass runabout, which was about 50 years old, that Mr Ritter and his friend Jay Armstrong bought in May 2016.

The boat sank and has never been found.

“None of the men in the boat had much boating experience. None of them, including Mr Ritter, held a motor boat licence or any other type of boating qualification at all,” Mr Cooper said.

He said when Mr Ritter and Mr Armstrong bought the boat they did not perceive the boat had any defects and did not have it professionally inspected to assess its seaworthiness.

“No member of the party seems to have told anyone where they were going. Crucial, mandatory safety equipment — life jackets — was missing. Recommended equipment — marine radio, EPIRB — was not on the boat,” Mr Cooper said.

“It is likely that any of these things — inspection, proper qualification, compliant minimum safety equipment, and recommended safety equipment — may have altered the outcome of what should have been an enjoyable day’s fishing.”

Mr Cooper said Marine and Safety Tasmania was considering necessary reform and public awareness regarding vessel standards and registration, retrofitting buoyancy, boat licensing, and recreational boating safety generally.

He said he would not make any recommendations in relation to the regulatory system, but he did recommend anyone buying a second-hand boat have it inspected before use by a suitably qualified person.

Mr Cooper commented that it was critically important for people on the water to use life jackets, and to service and wear them correctly. He said recreational boat owners should also carefully consider their vessel’s capacity and whether buoyancy should be retrofitted.

Mr Cooper also said a recreational boat licence was an important requirement. “It is not just the law, but also a matter of life and death.”

Mr Cooper said the only person in a position to know whether Mr Ritter’s boat had any defects was its previous owner, James Castle, who Mr Cooper said was an “unimpressive and unreliable witness”.

Speaking outside the court, Mr Ritter’s mother, Sabine Wagner, said she would continue to lobby for legislative reform, but she understood how difficult it was to determine what it means for a boat to be considered seaworthy.

“What could be assessed is that a boat can be structurally sound,” Ms Wagner said.

Ms Wagner said she, like other parents who had lost a child, would carry the sadness of Mr Ritter’s death forever.

Mr Cooper said all four men died in the waters of Frederick Henry Bay on July 31. He said Mr Davies and Mr Ritter drowned, but there was not enough evidence for him to determine the cause of the other two men’s deaths.

He said some remains of Mr Drobnjak were found, but no trace of Mr Roche was ever found, despite an extensive search of the area.